Watch: Meet The Ice Skater Who’s Erotic Art Hobby Made Him “the Grandfather Of Gay Photography”

Growing up, filmmaker Keri Pickett adored her Uncle Roy, even though he was rarely home, his life a mystery to her, which made him all the more enchanting.

A professional figure skater, Roy Blakey was often traveling the world, performing with popular shows like Holiday on Ice in the ’50s and ’60s. During this time, he developed two hobbies. One was collecting posters, garments, and other memorabilia from the shows he performed in, a private collection which, over time, would amount to what’s been called the world’s largest archive of theatrical figure skating.

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The other hobby was photography. Blakey started off photographing his fellow performers, but once he retired from figure skating, he moved to New York City, set up a studio space to shoot friends and eventually plenty of famous faces, from Bette Midler to Divine.

After graduating college, Pickett was determined to follow in her uncle’s footsteps as a photographer, so she went out to NYC to stay with him, and the pair grew closer than ever before.

But there was still another side of his life she had no idea about. That is, until many years later when she was browsing an art gallery and came across a collection of erotic photos of men, all of which were attributed to Roy Blakey.

Little did Pickett know, her dear uncle Roy was considered “one of the grandfathers of gay photography,” his work hailed for—as New York Times photography critic Gene Thornton once put it—transform[ing] the young male body into an aesthetic rather than a sexual object.”

Shot in his Manhattan studio and on Fire Island, Blakey’s work was boundary-breaking in its frank depiction of gay life, physicality and sensuality. It appeared in publications like Mandate and After Dark, was exhibited everywhere from acclaimed galleries to the infamous Continental Baths, and was even compiled & published in Blakley’s own 1972 photography book He.

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Discovering the true breadth of her uncle’s work only endeared Pickett to him further. In 2013, she made her feature filmmaking debut with the documentary The Fabulous Ice Age, which used Blakely’s private collection to tell the story of an era when figure-skating shows were among the most popular forms of entertainment in the world.

In the past decade, as Blakey approached his 90s, he began showing signs of dementia. Now serving as his full-time caretaker, Pickett felt an even greater urgency to preserve his work—not just the figure skating collection, but also the decades of gay photography, which double as documents of queer history.

In her latest feature, Uncle Roy, Pickett pays tribute to her lifelong hero while documenting her own efforts to find the perfect home for his sprawling archives. The film recounts Blakey’s amazing story as a trailblazing gay artist & performer, underscores the importance of elder care, and reminds us all why it’s so vital that we uncover and protect our LGBTQ+ history before it’s forgotten.

After premiering internationally earlier this year, the documentary is next set to play the queer film festival circuit this month, including Pittsburgh’s Reel Q on Oct. 9, Rochester’s ImageOut on Oct. 11, the SCAD Savannah Film Festival on Oct. 30, and it’ll have its NYC debut at NewFest, the city’s premier LGBTQ+ film festival, on Oct. 18 (it will also be available to stream via the fest’s virtual platform from Oct. 15 – 30).

“With Uncle Roy, I reveal my heart in a way I have never done,” Pickett shares in a statement ahead of feels like a homecoming screening at NewFest. “This film intimately documents the beautiful last years of our life together. I couldn’t be more excited and proud to premiere the film at NewFest in New York City, where Roy began his professional photography career that illuminated the LGBTQ+ community.”

Ahead of these fall festival dates, check out the Uncle Roy trailer below, and be sure to follow the film’s Instagram account for all the latest updates on when you might be able to see the doc at a festival near you:

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