Legacy in pink: First Black-owned gay bar in San Francisco reborn as art at the Walker
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A new club has opened at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, where visitors — everybody! — are invited to dance now, as C+C Music Factory once demanded.
“The New Eagle Creek Saloon” has all the elements of a good gay bar. It’s a pink-soaked room with ample dance space, music on certain nights to get you up on your feet and a crew of talented bartenders around a U-shaped bar. But what makes it unusual is it’s also an art installation.
“This is my artwork, you are all also now a part of my artwork,” said artist Sadie Barnette, creator of “The New Eagle Creek Saloon,” on opening night March 7.
The project premiered in San Francisco, Calif., in 2019 and has since traveled to New York, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles. The installation at the Walker is its Midwest debut.
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The project is a reimagining of the first Black-owned gay bar in San Francisco. Barnette’s father, Rodney, was the owner and operator of the original Eagle Creek Saloon. Rather than being a one-for-one recreation, Barnette has reimagined the bar.
“I abandoned any notion of recreating exactly what my dad’s bar looked like, we didn’t have a ton of documentation,” the artist said.
“And it actually freed me up to just make it look completely like my dream of a bar.”
The exhibit is open at the Walker through May 19, with happy hours planned on Thursday nights. Bartending and drink selection is provided by Mama San Bar Collective, a “BIPOC & Queer collective making bartending more accessible, inclusive and fun.”
