A Postcard to Herman N

Artistic Research, since 2024.


Nemer received an expectated donation of over 800 homoerotic postcards from the Fonds Suzan Daniel, Belgium’s LGBTQ+ archive based in Ghent. The cards are duplicates and multiples from the postcard collection of Herman N., a man from West Flanders whose collection of gay magazines, calendars, and postcards had entered the archive’s keeping shortly after his death. The uninscribed cards date from the 1970s through 1990s and were published in France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom. 

Nemer has initiated research actions in which he shares the collection with friends who visit his studio, asking them to make arrangements of the postcards based on whatever criteria they wish: charting curatorial themes, following erotic or affective impulses, or even Tarot-style divining. While the goals of this research are not yet clear, the initial direction reflects Nemer’s interests in queer kinship and transhistorical touch. Herman N. allegedly lived a closeted life, cut off from gay relation and community. Might gathering queer men to engage in haptic and effective contact with the postcards serve as an act of collective, erotic repair, reaching out to Herman N across time? A first expression of A Postcard to Herman N is planned for a 2025 edition of The Erotic Review.