Queer Arts Festival

Portals

June 6 – 28, 2025 | Queer Arts Festival

Centre A | and locations throughout the city

Portals are gateways to transformation—liminal spaces of transition, possibility, and change. For the 2025 Queer Arts Festival, Portals explores queer and trans experiences of crossing thresholds, stepping into new identities, and imagining futures beyond imposed boundaries. Presented in partnership with Centre A, this year’s curated visual exhibition also examines diasporic journeys, highlighting the intersections of queerness, migration, and belonging. In a time of rising anti-trans and anti-queer rhetoric, Portals is a call to reimagine the world, celebrating art’s power to forge new paths, challenge oppression, and open doors to liberation. Step through—what’s on the other side?

Full Festival Schedule

Queer Arts Festival PORTALS: June 6 – 28, 2025 Festival Theme: Portals Portals are gateways to transformation—liminal spaces of transition, possibility, and change. For the 2025 Queer Arts Festival, Portals explores queer and trans experiences of crossing thresholds, stepping into new identities, and imagining futures beyond imposed boundaries. Presented in partnership with Centre A, this year’s curated visual exhibition also examines diasporic journeys, highlighting the intersections of queerness, migration, and…

ArtParty! | June 21 | 5-8pm | Centre A | Step through the portal and into the party! Join us on June 21 from 5–8pm at Centre A for the 2025 QAF ArtParty, launching our signature exhibition Portals—a powerful exploration of migration, identity, and transformation, curated by Diane Hau Yu Wong and Mark Takeshi McGregor. Celebrate with art, community, and irresistible beats by guest DJ OShow, as we celebrate QTBIPOC resilience and…

VARIED EDITIONS — Curated by Edward Fu-Chen Juan & Cheryl Hamilton | Jun 6 – 28 | Tues – Sat, 12 – 6 | On Main Gallery | Free | Now in its third year, Varied Editions celebrates the diversity of printmaking practices within queer communities. Borrowing its name from the printmaking technique where artists alter individual prints within an edition, the exhibition reflects on queerness as a shared yet…

Night Owl: Erica Roozendaal, accordion | Sunday, June 8 @ 7pm | SUM gallery | Pay-What-You-Wish | We’re thrilled to present the QAF debut of Dutch accordionist Erica Roozendaal. Visiting us from the Hague, Roozendaal shares an intimate program at SUM gallery that includes music by the iconic Pauline Olivieros, plus Erica’s own autobiographical showpiece, Night Owl. This beautiful and moving performance subtly addresses the theme of abuse and growing up…

QAF Community Art Show | June 14 – 28 | Tues – Sat, 12 – 6 | SUM gallery | OPENING RECEPTION: June 14, 5 – 8pm | Free | It’s no exaggeration to say the QAF Community Art Show is the backbone of our festival. It was the original event, begun in 1998, that would grow into the Queer Arts Festival as we know it today. The QAF Community…

Curated Visual Art Exhibition: PORTALS — Curated by Mark Takeshi McGregor & Diane Hau Yu Wong | June 21 – August 23 | Wed – Sat, 12 – 6 | Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art | Free | Our QAF 2025 theme is fully realized in this special exhibition partnership with Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art. Curated by Diane Hau Yu Wong and Mark…

Queer Clothing Swap | June 22, 2 – 4pm | Sun Wah Centre, 4th Floor | Free | Looking to spice up your summer wardrobe? Look no further: We’re bringing back our super popular Queer Clothing Swap! Bring your clean, gently worn, unscented clothes over to the Sun Wah Centre on June 22nd and leave with some free, fab looks. Clothes can be dropped off starting at 12:30pm, with the…

Long Live Kings — Directed by Romi Kim | June 22, 1pm | SUM gallery | Free | Long Live Kings is a multi-episode series that puts a much needed spotlight on the vibrant Drag King scene on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples (aka Vancouver). Created as a response to the isolation Drag Kings often experience within drag spaces, this series uplifts the artistry and…

Presenting a Trio of Events in Partnership with Vancouver International Jazz Festival

Bruno Hubert Trio with Brad Turner | Granville Island Jazz | June 25, 2pm | Performance Works | Pay-What-You-Wish Bruno Hubert is one of Canada’s most expressive jazz pianists, with a deep sense of swing and melody that evokes Erroll Garner, Herbie Hancock, and Bill Evans—while always remaining unmistakably Bruno! A key fixture on the Vancouver jazz scene for over twenty years, Hubert’s trio with bassist André Lachance and drummer…

Raagaverse featuring Cassius Khan | Granville Island Jazz | June 26, 8:30pm | Ocean Artworks | $15 at the door 2025 JUNO nominees for Jazz Album of the Year (Group), creative Indo-Jazz fusion band Raagaverse pays homage to two historical and culturally-significant genres: classical Hindustani music and jazz. Led by vocalist Shruti Ramani, with Jodi Proznick bass, Noah Franche-Nolan piano, and Nicholas Bracewell drums, Raagaverse retains the authenticity of both traditions,…

Allie Lynn King, Nate McBride, and Kenton Loewen | Granville Island Jazz | June 28, 5pm | Revue Stage | Pay-What-You-Wish Anchored in improvisation, Vancouver guitarist Allie Lynn King blends the roots of blues and jazz with the heaviness of doom metal and the abrasion of noise. Bassist Nate McBride (MESTIZX) calls Chicago home, but his collaborations with the likes of Dennis Gonzalez, Jeb Bishop, and Ken Vandermark span the…