By Kristi Alexandra @kristialexandra | Looselips Magazine | June 23, 2020
Feature photo by Noam Gagnon
“Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others,” Oscar Wilde famously said.
It points to a quandary of human judgement–who is wicked, and who gets to say so? Is it a given label, or does one get to righteously claim it?
It’s on this premise that the 2020 Vancouver Queer Arts Festival is built, and artistic director SD Holman has curated a lineup of transdisciplinary art and artists that embody the meaning of the word.
Starting off on July 16, the 10-day festival will include drag and burlesque performances, literary readings, speculative theatre and more–all in celebration of queer identity.
“I think it’s so apropos that wicked came up right now at this moment,” Holman tells Loose Lips Mag. “I think artists are outlaws, and queers are the ones that I’m interested in.”
Holman draws a parallel between the theme of the 12th annual Queer Arts Festival and the current state of the world.
“There’s many layers to it, right now, especially, with the pandemic and with the killings and the police brutality. [What’s] coming to my mind is inclusion. Inclusion at what cost? Inclusion for who? Our inclusion is contingent on a set of rules,” theyspeculate.
“Years ago, they wanted to get rid of the drag queens and leather dykes at the pride parade. Inclusion depends on us being palatable. I want to see good art that can fall outside of that palatability.”
And this year’s lineup of performers does just that.
Indigenous burlesque group Virago Nation
Take for example, all-Indigenous burlesque group Virago Nation, who will perform Too Spirited on July 17. The group bucks colonial interpretations of beauty in what they call sexual rematriation.
Also on the docket is The Darlings, a non-binary drag collective whose performances have been repeatedly censored by Facebook. As a nod, their July 24 performance is aptly called The Darlings, Uncensored.
Other acts include contemporary dance legend Noam Gagnon and queer writers Hiromi Goto and Erica Isomura.
“I like to highlight local, but I also love to bring in folks from away, so people can talk to each other across the disciplines and across time and across space,” says Holman. “I wanted to bring art into the world and into Vancouver that I wasn’t seeing.”
Photo from The Darlings
As with every year, Queer Arts Festival has made a big effort to be accessible, both with ASL interpretations and with by-donation events.
“Accessibility is really high up on our list and mandate,” Holman affirms, noting that ASL interpretations have always been part of the festival.
What’s entirely different this year, however, is 2020’s QAF is “going remote.” For the festival’s team, it came with its own unique challenges, but also with wins and determination.
“We were able to partner with The Cultch and do filming there, and we’re managing how to do that in a safe way. We have a safety plan, they have their safety plan,” Holman reveals. “It was our opportunity to say ‘Let’s re-envision this as something completely different.’”
And different is exactly what Queer Arts Festival is all about. One might dare say, it’s about to get “wicked.”
Queer Arts Festival runs online from July 16 – 26. Check out the schedule, lineup and get tickets here.
Kristi Alexandra is an unabashed wino and wannabe musician. Her talents include drinking an entire bottle of cabernet sauvignon, singing in the bathtub, and falling asleep
SD Holman, artistic and executive director of the Queer Arts Festival, which takes place July 16-26. (photo from QAF)
“Since the very beginning, I said not doing the festival was not an option … because my belief is that they [the arts] are really, really important – I would say essential.”
Sharing their appreciation for the vital work being done by those on the frontlines of the COVID-19 crisis, SD Holman, artistic and executive director of the Queer Arts Festival, said, “art is really keeping people alive, in different ways than the amazing health workers that are taking care of folks right now. Even people who say they don’t like art – if you read a book, if you watch Netflix, you take part in the art world.”
This year’s Queer Arts Festival, which takes place July 16-26, will happen mostly online. This is, of course, not what was initially planned.
By mid-May, Holman said, “we had to have a plan. And, right now, we’re still working on how the delivery is going to look because it’s not all digital. One of the things that was really important to us, to me, is that, not all people have computers, not all people have a stable wi-fi access, people can’t go to the libraries [now] if they don’t have computer, so how do people access it? If they’re not privileged enough to have this little box in front of them, how do we deliver a festival?”
One of the things being considered is billboard art. As well, there is the possibility of using parks as venues.
The planning of such a festival normally starts a year in advance, not the couple of months that COVID has allowed for a reimagined version. Some elements – such as the visual arts show – have been adapted for the new circumstances, while some will have to be postponed, as they do not lend themselves to online viewing, because they are interactive on some level, or the artists can’t make it to Vancouver.
When asked about the process for choosing festival artists, Holman said, “I talk a lot to people, I try and keep abreast of what’s going on. I always want to support local artists and also bring in folks from away, so that there are great conversations that happen of what’s going on in the world, as well as what’s happening here.”
The festival programmer does research and people can also apply to be part of the festival. As well, Holman said, “There’ll be people that talk to me about wanting to do something, and that usually percolates for two or three years before anything ever happens.”
Holman has been with the festival since its beginnings as a volunteer collective in 1998. “Two-spirit artist Robbie Hong, black artist Jeffrey Gibson were the main founders of Pride in Art [Society],” they explained. “I was an artist and then I became involved in the collective in 2005, when Robbie was wanting to step away … and I called in Dr. Rachel Kiyo Iwaasa because she had approached me about something and I said, ‘Come and join me on this.’ And we spearheaded making it professional, making it a festival…. It was a community visual art show up until that point…. As an artist myself, I wanted to pay artists – too often artists are expected to do stuff for free, and that’s impossible.”
According to the festival website, PiA became a not-for-profit in 2006, mounted its first festival in 2008 and rebranded to become the Queer Arts Festival in 2010, obtaining charitable status in 2012.
“Rachel has finally managed to extricate herself,” said Holman, “because we also both have our own arts practices and it’s very hard to run this organization and also have an arts practice; it might have fallen a bit by the wayside, but Rachel is a concert pianist. [She’s] no longer staff with us, [but] she’s still doing some contract work with us and passing over her organizational knowledge.”
While Holman is a photo-based artist, the festival remains their focus. It is the belief that “art changes people and people change the world” that motivates them, “because it’s important work” – “when a country is taken over, the first people they suppress are the artists.… You take over the media and you get rid of the artists because people can be completely destroyed – the first thing they start doing [to recover] is making art, whether it’s in a mud puddle, making a mud pie, they start, that is, expression; that’s what brings them back.
“Art reaches you on a visceral level,” Holman continued. “There’s this thing called confirmation bias, so we take in more what we already agree with, but art can get you in a way that can transform our ways of thinking.”
For Holman, being queer and Jewish are parts of their larger identity. Holman has self-described, for example, as “a queer pagan Jew” and “a Jewish, butch, bearded dyke.”
“I come from L.A.,” they told the Independent. “I was born and raised in L.A., and I have had several Jewish friends be, ‘Oh, you’re too much for Vancouver.’ And I’ve been here for a long time … [but] people are, ‘Why aren’t you in New York, why aren’t you in L.A.? Why aren’t you where you can be more?’ I always get this feeling here … that people are always trying to be, ‘Shh, could you just be a little bit quieter, could you just be not quite so much?’ There’s this too-muchness about Jews. And there’s kind of this too-muchness about queers, too. There’s this assimilation. My family assimilated – I got, from my bubbie and my great-aunt, I would get Christmas cards. We’re Jewish! But we assimilated because that was what was safe for us. And so there’s all this assimilation and erasure that happens with queers and Jews, because, also, many of us can pass; we can pass as straight, we can pass as not Jewish.”
Despite skepticism about the possibility of Jews being fully accepted – the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville a couple of years ago featured chants of “Jews will not replace us,” for example – Holman is completely out there in her Jewishness and queerness, in a seemingly fearless way.
“Oh no, I’m afraid of everything, that’s why I do it,” they said. “Although, that’s not true anymore. Since my wife died [in 2009], I don’t fear anything because the worst thing has already happened to me. But I used to be, I was quite fearful.… [However] I’ve never been able to be in the closet about anything really. And, I guess, for me, that’s kind of Jewishness, [being] more emotive and not afraid to debate, not always trying to please people. For me, it comes from my Jewish heritage.”
Despite the many accolades for their art and for their work with the Queer Arts Festival, including the 2014 YWCA Women of Distinction Award in Arts and Culture, Holman said, “I have been a failure all my life.” Among their reasons for that description, Holman said they are dyslexic. They added, “I’m butch, so that’s a failure as a woman; feminists were called failures as women.” But, they said, they are working with that in their art and, on the positive side, being a failure “frees you up to make your own rules, so make your own rules.”
The theme of this year’s Queer Arts Festival is “Wicked.” The press release quotes Oscar Wilde: “Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others.”
“It’s always really multi-layered the theme and then people take different stuff out of it,” said Holman. “So, there’s also the book Wicked … because Wicked is about it’s not easy being green, it’s not easy being different. It’s not easy being a Jew, it’s not easy being queer. It’s not easy being butch, it’s not easy being an activist. It’s all actually about activism, the book Wicked.”
In addition, there is, as Holman writes in the press release, the question, “What do we lose – who do we lose – if we accept induction into the dominant order, and reframe ourselves as a ‘moral minority’?”
“It’s a bit of a double pun,” they explained to the Independent. “The ‘Moral Majority’ years ago, who were trying to say [what’s acceptable in society], the right-wing, and there’s the ‘model minority,’” the Asian community, whose perceived greater-than-average success and stereotypical politeness are used to downplay the existence of racism. “It totally ties in with what I was talking about ‘too-muchness’ and excess and how we, as queers, work towards justice and inclusion.”
While becoming “more acceptable,” Holman said, “it’s still, ‘please don’t scare the horses.’… So, it’s OK if you want to be gay and lesbian and you want to get married and you want to have kids and you want to buy a house and be part of the whole heteronormative [framework] … be part of society’s morals, but could you leave the drag queens and the leather dykes at home?… Even with gender stuff. We know now that it’s a real spectrum and people are getting [more accepted], trans are really out in the world [for example] and it’s OK if you want to be a ‘real woman’ or a ‘real man,’ whatever that is, but people in between are still, ‘Come on, could you choose a side?’
“There’s this whole [feeling like], we’ve given you these things, we’ve given you marriage rights, you can have children, you can affirm your gender, you can do those things, but could you now just be nicer to us? And, I think, we have to be careful of that – being sanctioned by the state of what’s OK [because] then people get left behind, and that’s what we’re seeing right now … the more privilege you gain, you have to be really careful of that,” of remembering that not everyone is being treated well.
The QAF opens on July 16. “And we’re going to have a binge/party at the end, on the 26th, and there’ll be prizes,” said Holman. “We’re going to play the whole entire festival. I think it’s going to be 12 hours or something – we’re inviting people to get into their best dress jammies.
“Everything is going to be pay-what-you-can, by donation…. Pay as much as you can, please, because we want to support the artists.”
Among those artists are Jewish community members Avram Finkelstein, from New York, who helps open the festival (see jewishindependent.ca/political-art-of-living) and locally based Noam Gagnon, whose work This Crazy Show (July 25-26) is described as “a reflection on the quest for love, through revisiting the worlds of childhood, both real and imagined.” In it, he “choreographs and performs, pushing himself to his physical limit to explore and expose ‘the art of artifice’ in a culture obsessed with pretending authenticity. This Crazy Show explores just how precarious and ambiguous identity can be, through the evolution of the body and the self, as both are continuously morphing, unfixed and boldly celebrated.”
Art holds the ability to connect people despite their race, culture, gender, or sexuality. As we find ourselves in midst of a global pandemic, feeling connected is now more important than ever.
The 12th annual Queer Arts Festival (QAF) takes place from July 16 to 26, and features a curated lineup of visual art, performing arts, workshops, artist talks, panels, and media art screenings. To follow suggested social distancing guidelines, this year’s entertaining and thought-provoking festival will be easily accessible to all through an online platform.
As noted in the festival’s press release, QAF’s 2020 theme, Wicked, “reimagines identity politics, exposing the implications of homonormativity as erasure”. It will also explore the commodification of the queer experience, which is sure to spark discussion among those who attend the virtual festival.
All of the brilliant multidisciplinary events at the online festival will evoke emotion and wonder. Here are five highlights not to be missed:
Art Party! Cinq-à-Sept festival opening
The QAF kick-off is happening on Thursday, July 16 from 5 to 7 p.m. This will feature a visual art tour curated by Jonny Sopotiuk and other guest artists.
Too Spirited
At 7 p.m. on Friday, July 17, an Indigenous burlesque show that is performed by Virago Nation will dazzle viewers who tune in. The performers will explore Indigenous sexuality through humor, pop culture, and politics.
Rupture Probe: Queer Inquiries & Remediations
On Saturday, July 18 at 7 p.m., QAF attendees can stream the screenings of queer short films that rupture normative notions of gender, activism, and pleasure. This media art event is curated in partnership with VIVO Media Arts Centre.
The Darlings, Uncensored
On Friday, July 24 at 7 p.m., The Darlings will perform a genre-bending, non-binary drag show with a new performance created around the festival theme of “wickedness”. The Darlings have taken the local drag scene by storm and are comprised of talented drag performers: Continental Breakfast, PM, Rose Butch, and Maiden China.
Glitter is Forever: Pyjama Party
If you had to miss some of the previous events, you can curl up on the couch and binge-watch the entire QAF on Sunday, July 26. The closing pyjama party will start at 4 p.m. and run until late so this is the perfect opportunity to make fancy espresso martinis. Wear your favourite silk robe and expect an evening filled with surprises, special prizes, attention-grabbing performances and remarkable visual art.
The Pride in Art Society is always accepting donations that go toward the festival, programs for adults and youth, and much more. To make a donation to the community-based nonprofit, visit its CanadaHelps page.
Six virtual exhibits on this summer bring LGBTQ2 art from the gallery into your home
A photo from 1995’s ‘Wigstock’ festival in New York City. Credit: Pierre Dalpé, Courtesy Head On Festival
Even though we cannot physically celebrate together, it’s Pride Month, and many LGBTQ2 organizations around the world have taken the initiative to ensure that Pride events still happen virtually.
It hasn’t been an easy task, especially for queer and trans artists who can’t show their work in person. Many have faced unemployment, lost gigs and had to cancel events, and staying afloat has been difficult. It’s why, in this trying time, we need our queer artists more than ever—to tell our stories, give voice to our struggles and lift us up. Their work brings the glitz and the glam to Pride, and for those who are feeling down and isolated, their art is a perfect antidote.
If you can’t get out to celebrate this year, why not enjoy Pride from home while supporting LGBTQ2 artists? Here is a list of virtual queer art events and festivals from Canada and around the world that have gone virtual in honour of Pride Month.ADVERTISEMENT
In celebration of Pride, the Australian Head On Photo Festival is featuring Montreal photographer Pierre Dalpé’s exhibition, Wigstock. Wigstock was an annual Manhattan drag festival held from 1984 to 2001, founded by American queen Lady Bunny. Dalpé documented this festival during the mid-1990s when Wigstock was at its most popular. Log on for free at Head On’s website and see the wonderful photos of glamorous queens (including the iconic RuPaul herself!) in their finest, having a blast in the New York sunshine.
To mark Pride, San Francisco’s Queer Cultural Centre is hosting an online exhibition, Aquí Estamos / Here We Are—a collaboration between San Francisco Bay-area and Puerto Rican queer artists, curated by Juan Carlos Rodríguez Rivera. Influenced by the conditions of COVID-19 and the lockdown in Puerto Rico, these queer artists of colour respond to how our domestic space has shifted under the pressure of a pandemic. Artists Awilda Rodríguez Lora, Cristóbal Guerra, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Marcela Pardo Ariza and Pati Cruz will hold an Instagram takeover each Wednesday in June to share their work and conduct an online conversation on the Queer Cultural Centre’s Instagram. And on June 30, the artists and the curator will take part in a special roundtable discussion, Aquí Estamos Y Aquí Seguiremos / Here We Are and Here We Will Be, about reimagining domestic and safe spaces.
The annual Vancouver Queer Arts Festival is one of the top five professional queer multidisciplinary arts festivals in the world—and this year, it’s going online. Inspired by the play Wicked, this year’s festival encourages us to think about the rise in the commodification of queer culture and how queer culture is used and marketed in a way that’s easy for heteronormative audiences to understand and interact with. “What do we lose—who do we lose—if we accept induction into the dominant order, and reframe ourselves as a ‘moral minority?’” organizers ask. The festival kicks off on July 16 with artparty!, featuring a panel discussion and virtual tour of the curated art exhibition led by artist Jonny Sopotiuk and showcasing participating artists Tom Hsu, Avram Finkelstein, Diyan Achjadi and Elektra KB. The Media Arts Centre, Vivo, will be holding Media Nights on July 18 (“Rapture Probe”) and July 19 (“Return to Sodom North”) to explore the change in media used at queer art festivals. Writers Hiromi Goto and Erica Isomura will hold an intergenerational conversation on the importance of mentorship for writers of colour on July 25 (A Conversation on Queer Mentorship). And, not to be missed, the Indigenous burlesque group, Virago Nation, will be holding the virtual performance Too Spirited on July 17.ADVERTISEMENT
To attend these events, register through Eventbrite. All events are free, but participants can donate to support the festival.
Erotic horror film, ‘The Hunger,’ is among movies being screened during Queer|Art|Film. Credit: Courtesy Queer|Art|Film
Queer|Art, a website based in New York, supports queer artists who have lost the mentorship of queer artists taken by another global pandemic—the AIDS Crisis. To support LGBTQ2 artists during this difficult time, Queer|Art has created a list of resources for artists affected by COVID-19—and they are going ahead with their annual Queer|Art|Pride online summer festival. Events take place every Monday night in June through the video conferencing app Zoom. Support the festival and artists financially at the Book and Print Fair, where more than 30 artists will show their work for sale during the bi-weekly Show N’ Tell series. Plus, join a virtual tour called “This Used To Be Gay!” with art mentor Moe Angelos of New York’s East Village as well as a few Queer|Art|Film events.
Those interested can register through the Queer|Art site.
Feeling queer and creative? Fredericton, New Brunswick-based emerging artist, speaker and facilitator Al Cusack has assembled a series of eight art activity videos for the public Facebook group Queer Art @ Home. This group is open to queer individuals of all artistic skill levels with the goal of helping people connect during Pride. Videos will be released on Mondays and Thursdays this month featuring different prompts for colour and subject matter in the medium of your choice.
Cusack came up with the idea after reflecting on community and togetherness. “It’s Pride month and we have to forgo so many of our celebrations and commemorations,” he says. “I wanted to do something about this. I wanted there to be something for queer people of any age who feel alone.”ADVERTISEMENT
Cusack chose eight activities in homage to the original Pride Flag, designed by queer artist and activist Gilbert Baker. “While it might not feel like a big deal for those of us who have been out and active in the community for a long time,” Cusack explains, “it means a lot to people who are first coming out. It brings a lot of joy to see those colours.”
Watch Cusack explain how Queer Art @ Home will work in this introductory video, and get ready to share your progress and ask for constructive feedback or inspiration in the Facebook group.
Wishing that you could join a gallery tour, but in the comfort of your home? LGBTQ2 artists, curators and filmmakers from around the U.K. chose some of their favourite works of art from the Tate Britain gallery and interpreted them as queer works of art. The interpretations are varied and influenced by their lived experiences, and they explore personal connections as well as how the piece of art speaks to each of them as a queer person. This free display is curated by E-J Scott, who curated the U.K. largest collection of trans artefacts, and includes selected works spanning more than 450 years.
In addition to this display, Tate Britain has a number of LGBTQ2 online resources, including a partnership with Channel 4’s short film strand Random Acts, featuring the stories of six LGBTQ-identifying people like Ian McKellen, Kareem Reid and Jackie Kay. There is even LGBTQ content for kids: Watch YouTuber Olly Pike explore five LGBTQ art Stories at the Tate Britain, and learn about bisexual painter Gwen John and gay artist David Hockney.ADVERTISEMENT
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As these arts shows prove, we can still remain together in spirit, even if we’re physically far apart. Stay safe and happy Pride!
Editor’s note, Jun 23, 2020: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that RuPaul Charles was a founder of Wigstock. The story has been amended.This story is filed under Arts & Entertainment, Pride, Profile, DIY Pride
The 12th annual Queer Arts Festival (“QAF”), Vancouver’s artist-run, professional, multi-disciplinary roister of queer arts, culture and history, will take place online this year from July 16 to July 26, 2020.
Avram Finkelstein will be participating in the Queer Arts Festival, which takes place July 16-26. (photo by Alina Oswald)
A lot of it feels familiar, said New York-based artist and activist Avram Finkelstein about the current situation in the United States. The same American institutions that failed during the HIV-AIDS crisis are failing to effectively deal with the pandemic. And, when he was a teenager in the 1960s, cities were also being burned in America.
“It’s sad to think that we will be having the same struggles,” he told the Jewish Independent in a phone interview last week. “But, also, as you get older, you realize that progress is not a pendulum swing from left to right, it’s actually a spiral going forward and things do move to the right and they move to the left, but [there is] incremental change. So, part of me feels like we’re seeing the dying gasp of a world that I hope we’re leaving behind, and I see a world in the future that I want to live in. So that’s kind of helping me through this.”
Finkelstein was scheduled to come to Vancouver next month to participate in the Queer Arts Festival.
A founding member of the Silence=Death and Gran Fury collectives, as well as the political group ACT UP, he is the author of After Silence: A History of AIDS Through its Images (University of California Press, 2017). His artwork is part of the permanent collections of MoMA, the Smithsonian, and the Victoria and Albert Museum, to name but a few places, and his work has been shown around the world. He was set to unveil one of his new works in Vancouver. As it is, with the restrictions required to minimize the spread of COVID-19, he will be helping open the festival remotely, as part of a panel discussion chaired by curator Jonny Sopotiuk, which will also provide viewers with a tour of the festival’s art exhibition.
“I have a large mural that was going to be in the exhibition and now it’s going to be in a virtual space,” said Finkelstein. “I’m very excited about this piece and the fact that Jonny chose it – it’s the first time I’ve shown it…. I had a commission to do a work for the Shed, which is a new art space in New York, and, while I was waiting for the weaving tests of the final pieces – it’s a very large jacquard weaving – I decided to start drawing from the same source material as the cartoon for the weaving. I hadn’t drawn since recovering from a stroke; I had a stroke about two years ago…. I then realized that my hand isn’t my own, my body is no longer my own.”
The source material, he explained, “is a portrait of a gender-non-conforming friend who later transitioned. The work was all about corporeality as an abstraction and the ways in which we’re allowed to look at certain things, and what is public and what is private about gender and sexuality. And then, all of sudden, I realized, I’m actually talking about my own body in these drawings because my own body is not my own body anymore. I realized that I had made this sharp pivot from an abstract, theoretical idea of corporeality to this kind of war or dance, or I don’t know how to describe the physical process of having to use your entire body to hold a pencil.”
Despite the health, political and other challenges Finkelstein has faced, he remains hopeful.
“We’re trained to think that, if we don’t have hope, then the only thing that’s left is despair, but the truth is, hope isn’t so much the point – it’s the horizon that hope is sitting on and, so long as you can see a horizon, I think that, to me, is the same thing,” he said.
“I’m Jewish, as you know, and I think that Jews have a very different relationship to memory and to witnessing. If your people have been chased all over the globe for centuries, you take a long view. You sleep with one eye open, but you take a long view, and I think, therein, I’m eternally hopeful.”
In an interview in 2018, Finkelstein predicted that the situation in the United States would worsen before it improved.
“Which is another thing about being Jewish – you learn that there is no such thing as paranoia because it’s all real,” he said. “So, one could have seen, as plain as the nose on one’s face, where America was heading. And, in actual fact, what happened with Trump’s election was, we’ve joined the international march of global totalitarianism…. And, it’s not about to get really bad, it’s really, really bad. It’s really bad and I think that, here again, you can’t be Jewish and not think – not think your entire life, actually – in some way being prepared for, OK, what are the risks I’m willing to take if this happens? How far would I be willing to fight for other people if that happens. The shadow of Nazi Germany never escaped your consciousness.”
So how does Finkelstein conquer the fear?
“I guess I’ve replaced it with anxiety,” he said, laughing. But, he added, “I don’t know why I’m not fearful. I think that I was just raised – a day doesn’t go by that I’m not reminded of another lesson or another incident or another part of Jewish-American social history in the 20th century that my family was directly there for. I almost feel like I’m the Zelig of the left. All the stories you would tell my mother or my father, they’d be like, ‘Oh, yeah, we were there. We were there at the Robeson riots. Oh, yeah, we were there when they closed The Cradle Will Rock and everyone walked down the street’ – exactly the way it was in the last scene in Tim Robbins’ movie. When I saw it, it seemed too preposterous, I called my mother, said, ‘Could that have happened?’ And she started singing the song that Emily Watson sings in the film.
“So, I think I have such a sense of self that one could interpret it as fearlessness, but I think that it would be more accurate to say I was not given an alternative role model. I was raised to feel the suffering of others and, if other people are suffering, there’s no night’s sleep for me. So, there’s really no option – you’re either closing your eyes to something terrible or you’re doing everything you can to try and make it less terrible. And I think that that’s the Jewish condition.”
He described Jews as being like queer people. “We are everywhere,” he said. “We’re in every culture, we’re in every race, we’re in every gender, we’re in every country. We have every type of ethnic community that we surround ourselves with. An Ethiopian Jew is different from an Ashkenazi Jew, but we’re still all Jews.”
Though raised by atheists, he said, “I don’t think you’ll find anyone more Jewish than I am or than my family, but Jews are prismatic. We are many things. Consequently, I feel like I can’t speak on behalf of other Jews, I can only speak on behalf of myself.
“Likewise, I’ve always had people of colour in my family; I just always have. And, I learned very early on back in the ’60s, when the civil rights movement was fragmented between King and Stokely Carmichael and the Panthers, and everyone was choosing sides, I think that’s another example of what I’m talking about – there are many ways in which to be black. And so, I don’t feel like what I have to say about this current moment is anywhere near as important, essential, vital, critical … [as] a person of colour – what a person of colour has to say about this moment is much more important.”
The original Silence=Death poster has been adapted over the years by many people, including for use as a pin.
Finkelstein was one of the minds behind the now-iconic Silence=Death poster, which has been adapted over the years by many people. A variation of it could be seen in at least one of the recent protests. The original iteration encourages viewers to use their power and, for example, vote. In general, working towards solutions is an important part of Finkelstein’s activism.
“I think critiques are easier,” he said. “I think also we mistake public spaces, we mistake the commons, as a declarative space. I tend to think of it as an interrogative space. I think that, even in late-stage capitalism, when someone is trying to get you to put your money in a bank or go buy a soft drink, there’s something Socratic about the gesture of trying to get you to do something … you’re responding to it, you’re engaged in it, and that’s the interrogative part that I think is easy to overlook. And I think that’s where the answers are.
“I think that the way that the Silence=Death poster is structured is it’s really like a bear trap. We worked on it for nine months – the colour has certain codes and signifiers, and the triangle has another set of codes and we changed the colour of the triangle from the [concentration] camps and inverted it to obfuscate some of the questions about victimhood. And the subtext has two lines of text, one that’s declarative and one that’s interrogative, and the point size forces you into a performative interaction.”
This poster and other work with which Finkelstein has been involved include aspects that “people are very afraid to experience,” he said, “which is fallibility, mess-making and tension. And I find all of those things as generative, as kindness, support, community. They’re differently generative and … hearing so many people who are trying to figure out how to find their way in, as white people, into the conversations that are happening in America right now, is the same struggle as a young queer person trying to find their way into the AIDS crisis. I mentor a lot of young queer artists and activists and the first thing they say, their immediate impulse is, I have no right to this story, I wasn’t here, I didn’t live through it. To which my response is, immediately, you have every right to the story – it’s your story, it’s the story of the world…. Race is a white person’s problem. People of colour are paying the price for it, but the problem, the genesis of the problem, is whiteness. And we have to figure out how to talk about it…. But I think now is the time for listening.”
He said, “We have to know what our responsibilities are and this goes back to Judaism – our responsibilities as witnesses. You can’t let your discomfort change the importance of this moment or overshadow the importance of this moment.”
One of the things Finkelstein does is teach social engagement via flash collectives. “I think we’re never put into a position where people mentor our personhood,” he said. “We have people mentor us as computer programmers or healthcare providers or tax accountants or artists or writers, but … there’s something primeval which is missing in the way we’re acculturated, and the flash collective is almost shamanistic in that regard; it taps into this primal thing that is quite astonishing when you let it out.”
Understanding that he will not live forever, he said “the Silence=Death poster casts a very mighty shadow and it makes it very difficult for people to figure out how to make new work, if that’s what they think it has to be…. It became obvious to me that I could be talking about Silence=Death until the day I drop, but, one day, I am going to drop and I want other people to start making those new works and I thought this would be a way to get people to make new work.”
He described the collectives, which teach political agency, as being “like a stew of the top 10 hits of grassroots organizing in a condensed workshop that’s tailored to the individuals in the room.”
He said, “I believe that I don’t necessarily have to change the world because I know that there could be a teenager in 2050 who sees something that someone I worked with did that made them think of something else that I never would have thought of. That is the point of the work, not the how do I fix it before I’m gone, which is the dilemma of Larry Kramer [who passed away last month]. He really thought, and I think it’s really male, but it’s very men of a certain generation also – he really thought that he could fix the AIDS crisis, and it didn’t happen.”
Unfortunately, space doesn’t allow for most of what Finkelstein shared with the Independent about Kramer, who he described as “a complicated person.”
Kramer was a rhetorician, said Finkelstein. “And I’m a propagandist. We’re both rhetoricians in a way, but what was the dividing line that made Larry incapable of understanding the work that I did?… I felt like I understood his process better than he understood mine. And I started to think, well, here’s the difference between a person who articulates their rage with words and a person who articulates their rage with every tool in the toolbox…. Not to make myself sound superior, but I realized that I think of rage as sculptural; he thought of rage as rhetorical. I think of rhetoric as sculptural, I think of it as casting a shadow and activating social spaces. And I think that he was a Jewish gay man of a different generation and a lot of his rage was tied into his personal struggles. And I did not have those. I had other personal struggles, but I did not have them.”
As part of the Queer Arts Festival, Finkelstein will lead a flash collective on the question, “What does queer public space mean in a 21st-century pandemic?” He hopes the resulting work will be shown in a public space.
For more information about the festival, visit queerartsfestival.com. The next issue of the JI will feature an interview with QAF artistic director and Jewish community member SD Holman.
Cozy up for a night of storytelling with talented LGBTQ2+ voices of Canadian literature. Syrian-Canadian author @Dannyseesit returns to #QAF2020 for his fifth year with readings from @arsenalpulp poet Jillian Christmas, @fka_jayesimpson + more. https://bit.ly/2z7rD5Y
Submissions are NOW OPEN for the 2025 QAF Community Art Show!
Submissions are OPEN for our QAF Community Exhibition, held at SUM gallery this summer!
We’re inviting artists in our local Queer communities to contribute works that explore our 2025 festival theme, “Portals” – though all submitted works will be considered. We are delighted to be hosting the exhibition at QAF headquarters SUM gallery in the Sun Wah Building in Chinatown, from June 13 – June 28, 2025.
Portals are gateways to transformation— liminal spaces of transition, possibility, and change. ‘Portals’ explores queer and trans experiences of crossing thresholds, stepping into new identities, and imagining futures beyond imposed boundaries. Step through—what’s on the other side? 🏃➡️🌀
We are considering 2-D visual works, sculpture, digital art, and interdisciplinary works for submission.
Submission deadline: April 30, 2025.
Submissions are accepted via email at submissions@queerartsfestival.com
Submission Checklist:
Submissions for the QAF Community Art Show must include:
Artist name and preferred email address for contacting.
Digital images of artworks (individual files, jpgs, or links to a website or upload are best.)
Artwork information for each piece (title, medium, year, dimensions, and price if applicable).
Additional information that is helpful but not required:
Artist biography.
Artist statement.
Resume/cv.
Headshot.
Links/social media.
All works must be installation-ready (ie, framed, hanging brackets, wires, etc). QAF will be onsite for installation, but whenever possible Artist’s are encouraged to help!
West Coast Curated: Queer Chinese Diasporic Identity Narratives in Vancouver’s Chinatown
[In Vancouver’s historic Chinatown, across from markets piled high with dried goods and and a bakery that would be easy to pass by unnoticed (if it wasn’t for out-the-door line-ups) is the equally nondescript entrance to the Sun Wah Centre. The brick building is home to a cultural wealth of artists, and is currently housing Yellow Peril: Celestial Elements, a multi-media one-room immersive art show brought to life by Love Intersections, a media arts collective of queer Vancouver artists of colour.
Inside the centre and up a delightfully vintage looking elevator decorated with printed community notices in multiple languages, the fourth floor is home to the SUM Gallery. (Turn right from the elevator, walk straight through the kitchen, you’ll see the door.)
To stand in the small space with vibrant multi-channel video dominating half the room and pieces to explore, interpret and understand, is an experience to open yourself up to. The room brings together Chinese tradition, text, iconography and spirituality with West Coast North American settings, nature and mythos, that contemplate presences that are Indigenous, colonial and pop.
I connected with Jen Sungshine and David Ng, co-creative directors of Love Intersections to talk a bit more about the experience they created.
Is this the first time Love Intersections has curated an arts exhibit?
Jen: Yes! We started in 2014 as a media arts collective, making short documentaries of queer people of colour in our community. This is our first foray into visual arts and curation, and we are very grateful to the Pride in Arts Society/SUM gallery for their faith and generosity!
Your film, Yellow Peril: Queer Destiny debuted at the Vancouver Queer Film Festival in August 2019. A part of this exhibit breaks down some of the visuals from the film into multi-channel video projections. Would you consider this exhibit an extension of the film?
Jen: The exhibit was inspired by our 2019 experimental documentary, Yellow Peril: Queer Destiny, which follows local drag artist, Maiden China in a non-linear, 5-chapter narrative through the use of the Chinese Five Elements as a conduit for examining race, gender, sexuality, art and cultural “authenticity”.
David: Encouraged by the film’s success, we were given an opportunity to expand the film into a visual art exhibit to further explore what it means for us to be queer Asians of the diaspora. One of the main through-lines of both the film and the exhibit is bringing forth our ancestors/ancestry, into our re-imaginations of queer Asian futures. The four channel format allowed us to expand upon some of what we started with the 5 elements, and explore queerness, time, space, and identity in a different way.
The experience of being in the room, particularly on your own or perhaps in a small group, is very immersive. Can you tell me about the part the sound you chose plays into the exhibit?
David: The soundscape put together by Jamie Abugov is inspired by a mix of contemporary and traditional artists of Asian descent. We wanted to mix past and present music, to again play with the idea of time and space, queer identity, and cultural identity.
Tell us about “yellow peril”, turn-of-the-century racist terminology, and about the choice to use it in both the film and the exhibit.
David: Yes, the “Yellow Peril” was a racist narrative in the west in the early 1900s that framed the influx of Asian immigrants – mostly indentured labourers – as “invading” the West. Literature, film, and media representations would portray Asian people as conniving, drug using criminals, who had sinister agendas to infiltrate and invade the West. This anti-Asian racism is what drove the anti-Oriental riots, and the Asian exclusion acts in North America, and Europe.
Jen: We were drawn to the term “Yellow Peril” because we wanted to reclaim the term, and also turn it on it’s head. We’ve seen a sharp rise in queer Asian cultural organizing recently across Canada, and in a way our reclamation and insistence on enunciating our cultural identities, is “perilous” to white supremacy.
We also wanted to reference Paul Wong’s touring exhibition Yellow Peril: Reconsidered, as the exhibit (and Paul’s work) has been not only an inspiration for us, but paved the way for queer Asian artists today to express ourselves.
Part of this piece, according to the placards, has to do with dislodging Western linearity. Could you speak more about this?
Jen: In putting together the film and the exhibit, we started realizing that the notion of linear temporality – that is, time moving forward, sequentially – has limitations to our imaginations of queer cultural identity. The linear framework of “past-present-future”, for example, delimits our ability to think about how our ancestors dreamed us into the future; and that we are the product of our ancestors dreams.
David: We also wanted to push our ways of thinking about queer Asian identity, time, and space; outside of a Western point of departure. So we turned to the 5 elements in Chinese tradition, which are used in many facets of life, including medicine, spirituality, health, metaphysics, etc. In some ways, the 5 elements became the vehicle that we used to explore queer Asian cultural identity.
Please tell me about anything else you would like to add that you feel is integral to understanding this exhibit and your work.
Jen: We feel extremely lucky to have an outpour of support from the various communities we are a part of. Over 300 people showed up to our opening, holy moly! Beyond just coming to see the exhibit, we really want to create a sense of -space- within the confines of SUM Gallery. In working with, and exhibiting at, SUM, we recognize how meaningful it is to showcase in Chinatown’s BC Artscape Sun Wah building at 268 Keefer, home to over 70 artists, galleries, and culture work spaces dedicated to heritage, education, social justice and sustainability. There is a lot of conversation right now around “Vancouver’s changing Chinatown” and what that means for residents navigating an increasingly challenging, and changing, landscape.
David: We hope to express to visitors the importance of showcasing in such an environment and to ask ourselves, “why am I here? What kind of art, spaces and communities do I want to immerse and spend time in?” and for visitors to consider the meaningfulness of dedicated, artful spaces that we all play a role in curating. For us, it’s sharing and curating with the likes of fellow artists, Paul Wong and Sammy Chien, as well as with organizations we look up to, like Centre A, Full Circle: First Nations Performance, Youth Collaborative for Chinatown, Moniker Press, The Frank Theatre – we see ourselves as one small piece of the social puzzle, each of us weaving together a larger, multidimensional narrative of Chinatown. We hope that visitors will confront what it means to stand up for land rights/defenders, anti-racism, and thoughtful cultural spaces as we continue having wholehearted conversations together.
Jen: We have programmed several “activation” events throughout the exhibit run at SUM Gallery. Visitors should come to our Community Food Sharing + Dumpling Making activation on March 7, as well as the Grave Sweeping Activation / Closing Ceremony on April 4. All activation events are from 3:30pm-5:30pm.
From now until April 18th, 2020, Yellow Peril: Celestial Elements is on display at the SUM Gallery, with works by Jen Sungshine, David Ng, Kendell Yan/Maiden China and Jay Cabalu.
UPDATE: This show is now available for viewing by appointment only to encourage social distancing due to COVID-19. Contact info@queerartsfestival.com to arrange.
CBC arts Queeries: This exhibit explores queer Asian identity through the lens of China’s traditional five elements
Yellow Peril; The Celestial Elements is the brainchild of Vancouver media arts collective Love Intersections
Queeries is a weekly column by CBC Arts producer Peter Knegt that queries LGBTQ art, culture and/or identity through a personal lens. It won the 2019 Digital Publishing Award for best digital column in Canada.
Many traditional Chinese fields use five elements — wood > fire > earth > metal > water — to explain a wide array of phenomena, from the interaction between internal organs to the succession of political regimes. At Vancouver’s SUM Gallery, that same system is currently inspiring Yellow Peril; The Celestial Elements, an art exhibit that uses the elements to represent “the emotional, spiritual, and metaphysical properties of queerness within the Asian diaspora.”
The exhibit features a collection of multichannel installations, visual and sculptural activations that are intended to challenge how we view the past, present and future of the queer Asian experience. It’s curated by media arts collective Love Intersections, and if you’re in Vancouver between now and its closing date of April 18th, it’s an absolute must-see.
The exhibit was inspired by Love Intersection’s 2019 experimental documentary, Yellow Peril: Queer Destiny, which follows Vancouver drag artist Maiden China in a non-linear, five-chapter narrative through the use of the Chinese Five Elements.
“[The film is] a conduit for examining race, gender, sexuality, art and cultural authenticity,” Love Intersection co-creative directors Jen Sungshine and David Ng tell CBC Arts. “Encouraged by the film’s success, we were given an opportunity to expand the film into a visual art exhibit to further explore what it means for us to be queer Asians of the diaspora. One of the main through-lines of both the film and the exhibit is bringing forth our ancestors and ancestry into our reimaginations of queer Asian futures.”
An image from Yellow Peril: Queer Destiny. (David Ng)
Visitors to the exhibit will find four multi-disciplinary works by four different queer Asian artists: Sungshine and Ng themselves, as well as Jay Cabalu and Maiden China (a.k.a. Kendell Yen).
“Each bring forward a different subject of exploration within our own queer Asian-ness,” Sungshine says. “One of the themes of the exhibit is temporality, and how we can think about queer Asian identity outside of western linearity and approach.”
As noted, the exhibit is inspired by the Chinese Five Elements, specifically to explore “emotional, spiritual, and metaphysical properties of queerness within the Asian diaspora.” For example, one part of the large four-channel installation that occupies two of the gallery’s walls shows drag artist Maiden China performing an ancestral veneration ceremony at Larwill Park in Vancouver.
“[This] was the gathering site of the 1907 anti-Oriental riots, as a way to mark an image of the temporal relationship that this exhibit has within a history of anti-Asian sentiments in Canada,” Ng explains. “That ‘yellow peril’ has never really gone away.”
Another installation in the exhibit is “The Wall of Healing; A Race Towards a Cosmic Future,” which features an altar of Traditional Chinese Medicine against a backdrop of joss paper lined floor-to-ceiling.
“Underneath the altar, a cosmic laser projection is overlaid onto a scattering of calligraphy paper in text written by Jen’s father, detailing the evolving of the Chinese language in three different typefaces,” Ng explains. “In a way, we think about our past as not necessarily gone but fully woven into the language of the present, and translating our living as we race toward a healing future.”
The show opened earlier this month, and Ng and Sungshine said they feel “extremely lucky” to have had such an outpouring of support so far.
“Over 300 people showed up to our opening, holy moly,” Sungshine says. “Beyond just coming to see the exhibit, we really want to create a sense of space within the confines of SUM Gallery. In working with — and exhibiting at — SUM, we recognize how meaningful to showcase in [a building that is] home to over 70 artists, galleries and culture workspaces dedicated to heritage, education, social justice and sustainability. There is a lot of conversation right now around Vancouver’s changing Chinatown and what that means for residents navigating an increasingly challenging, and changing, landscape.”
They say that hope to express to visitors the importance of showcasing in such an environment.
“We see ourselves as one small piece of the social puzzle, each of us weaving together a larger, multidimensional narrative of Chinatown,” Ng says. “We hope that visitors will confront what it means to stand up for land rights defenders, anti-racism and thoughtful cultural spaces as we continue having wholehearted conversations together.”
Yellow Peril; The Celestial Elements. Curated by Love Intersections. SUM Gallery, Vancouver. Until April 18, 2020. www.sumgallery.ca
Peter Knegt has worked for CBC Arts since 2016, writing the LGBTQ-culture column Queeries (winner of the 2019 Digital Publishing Award for best digital column in Canada) and spearheading the launch and production of series Canada’s a Drag and interactive project Superqueeroes, both of which received 2020 Canadian Screen Award nominations. Beyond CBC, Knegt is also a stand-up comedian, the filmmaker of numerous short films and the author of the book About Canada: Queer Rights. You can follow him on Instagram and Twitter with the same obvious handle: @peterknegt.
Embrace your too-muchness with bombastic burlesque brought to you by the badass babes of Virago Nation, Turtle Island’s first all-indigenous burlesque collective. Featuring special guests Monday Blues and Lynx Chase! Whether you’ve seen it before or always wanted, now’s your chance to relish the many facets of indigenous sexual rematriation from the comfort of your living room.
Shane Sable “Mover, Shaker, Mischief Maker; the Furiously Flirtatious Force of Nature”
2Spirit Gitxsan artist and activist Shane Sable has slayed stages all over Vancouver in front of and behind the scenes since 2011. Shane has an abiding hunger for audience engagement and delights in the tension created by breaking the 4th wall of burlesque. Shane is the convening member of Virago Nation – Turtle Island’s first all-indigenous burlesque collective and Festival Administrator for the Vancouver International Burlesque Festival.
RainbowGlitz is one of Virago’s Nations founding members and Vancouvers Rainbow Slut spreading her love medicine in a mix of classic, nerdlesque, exotic dance and pussy cat doll hip hop movements. This Haida, Squamish, Musqueam and black artist will leave you wanting to throw your gold at the end of her rainbow.
Scarlet Delirium: Vancouver BC’s Raven Goddess! The Kwakiutl Indigi-Babe! Scarlet Delirium has been enjoying the slow burn of Burlesque and Cabaret since 2010 and is a founding member of Virago Nation. During the daylight hours doubles as Costume Designer for herself and her Burlesque family.
Sparkle Plenty is Vancouver’s glamedian, weirdlesquer, and word-maker-upper who has been delivering beautifully bizarre burlesque acts for over 10 years! This fiery goddess is Cree and Metis with mixed heritage and is a proud sister of the first ever all Indigenous burlesque group, Virago Nation. You can find her teasing and emceeing with the Screaming Chicken Theatrical Society as well as on stages all over Vancouver, Toronto, Las Vegas and more.
Monday Blues is an Afro-Indigenous burlesque artist, and has been performing burlesque professionally since 2011. Monday has traveled the globe as a solo female adventurer and loves to live outside her comfort zone. Her most recent endeavours include being an avid entrepreneur, both in Sex Work and coaching capacities, as well as pursuing her passion on the burlesque stages all over Canada and the US. Monday strives to exist without limits and wants to help others feel just as empowered.
Lynx Chase: A true showpony at heart, Lynx Chase has always been passionate about movement and performance arts. Over the years she has trained in a variety of disciplines ranging from Aerial Hoop, Silks, Contortion, Partner Acrobatics, Bellydance & Capoeira; however it wasn’t until she discovered Pole Dancing in 2012 that she found her true vocation. Lynx has been professionally teaching in Vancouver since 2015 and has also showcased her gravity defying acts at various events and festivals across the province such as Retro Strip Show, Bass Coast and Shambhala Music Festival. It is her hope to continue to share her craft with the world by demonstrating the strength, sensuality, artistry and grace that goes hand in hand with the art of pole and exotic dance.
Get your dress jammies on, grab a drink and binge-watch the entire Queer Arts Festival with us (take it all in!!). Expect surprises and special prizes.
From the roots of the Queer Arts Festival, this open visual art show honours our founder, Two-Spirit artist Robbie Hong and 21 years of Pride in Art organizing.
This show will launch online on July 16 and run through to July 26.
2020 Artists
Chris Watson CREATEIIV Edward Bader Ilena Lee Jackson Photographix Kate Braun Kyla Yin Michel Dumont Mikayla Fawcett Vladimir Kolosov
