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LGBT+ History Month
On this page, we’re sharing various websites, events and resources as well as staff picks related to LGBT+ History Month.
AUDIO PLAY
This year, we’re sharing an exclusive audio play called Ask For Sophie by Kerrie Marsh, which was commissioned by us in 2021 as part of our project Keepsake.
Ask For Sophie was a free telephone play exploring rural isolation in LGBTQ+ communities.
When audience members rang a number, a chatty and eponymous character called Sophie answered the call. The audience member played the role of a silent caller to an LGBTQ+ support line for people in rural areas.
You can listen to a recording of the play below.
If you enjoyed listening to Ask For Sophie, we encourage you to check out writer Kerrie Marsh’s website here, and consider making a donation to Yorkshire MESMAC. Yorkshire MESMAC provide services for LGBT people across North Yorkshire. You can find out more about their work and how to make a donation here.
VIRTUAL EVENTS
Take a look at the LGBT+ History Month website for events in the UK.
WEBSITES AND RESOURCES
Education: LGBT History Month Packs 2021 – Reception to Post-16
Mind: mental health support for LGBTIQ+
Healthwatch North Yorkshire LGBT Youth Groups
STAFF PICKS:
Artists
MarcoLooksOut – LGBT work by MarcoLooks, York (who exhibited a Print Swap at The Courthouse in September 2021)
Phyliss Christopher – the exhibition “Contacts” is now on display at Baltic, Gateshead.
Keith Haring (pictured above)
Keith Allen Haring (May 4, 1958 – February 16, 1990) was an American artist whose pop art and grafitti-like work grew out of the New York City street culture of the 1980s. Much of his work includes sexual allusions that turned into social activism. He achieved this by using sexual images to advocate for safe sex and AIDS awareness.(Bio via Wikipedia)
David Hockney
David Hockney, (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century. (Bio via Wikipedia)
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon (28 October 1909 – 28 April 1992) was an Irish-born English figurative painter known for his raw, unsettling imagery. Focusing on the human form, his subjects included crucifixions, portraits of popes, self-portraits, and portraits of close friends, with abstracted figures sometimes isolated in geometrical structures. Rejecting various classifications of his work, Bacon claimed that he strove to render “the brutality of fact.” He built up a reputation as one of the giants of contemporary art with his unique style. (Bio via Wikipedia)
Marlow Moss
Marjorie Jewel “Marlow” Moss (29 May 1889 – 23 August 1958) was a British Constructivist artist who worked in painting and sculpture. (Bio via Wikipedia)
Catherine Opie
Catherine Sue Opie (born 1961) is an American fine-art photographer. She lives and works in West Adams, Los Angeles as a tenured professor of photography at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). Opie studies the connections between mainstream and infrequent society. By specializing in portraiture, studio and landscape photography, she is able to create pieces relating to sexual identity. Through photography, Opie, documents the relationship between the individual and the space inhabited. (Bio via Wikipedia)
Zanele Muholi
Zanele Muholi (born 19 July 1972) is a South African artist and visual activist working in photography, video, and installation. Muholi’s work focuses on race, gender and sexuality with a body of work looking at black lesbian, gay, transgender and intersex individuals. Muholi is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns, explaining that they “identify as a human being”. (Bio via Wikipedia)
More:
Google Arts & Culture: 8 LGBTQI+ Artists You Should Know
TV and Films
Queer Eye Season 6
Euphoria
Everybody’s Talking About Jamie
Rocketman
Channel 4: It’s A Sin – Drama from Russell T Davies about five friends living and loving in the shadow of AIDS.
Netflix: Disclosure – Led by Laverne Cox, in this documentary, leading trans creatives and thinkers share heartfelt perspectives and analysis about Hollywood’s impact on the trans community.
Netflix: The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson – As she fights the tide of violence against trans women, activist Victoria Cruz seeks to uncover the truth of her friend Marsha’s death while celebrating her legacy.
Schitts Creek – A married couple suddenly go bankrupt and the only remaining asset they have is an ugly small town named Schitt’s Creek.
BBC: LGBTQ+ Documentaries – A collection of programmes exploring experiences of being LGBTQ+ in the UK.
Books
The Transgender Issue – Shon Faye
Queer London – Alim Kheraj
Girl, Woman, Other – Bernardine Evaristo
Shuggie Bain – Douglas Stuart (Booker Prize Winner 2020)
Rainbow Milk – Paul Mendez
Music
Years & Years
L Devine
King Princess
Lil Nas X
Ben Platt
MUNA
Vincint
Pitchfork: 50 Songs That Define the Last 50 Years of LGBTQ+ Pride
Musical Theatre
Subway – LGBT love story set on a New York subway train (available on demand)
Pieces of String – LGBT love story set in the Second World War (available on demand)
QUEER ME – an evening of LGBTQ+ Storytelling (live 10th Feb, on demand 11th – 25th)
Pieces of String – LGBT love story set in the Second World War (available on demand whenever.)
Everybody’s Talking About Jamie
Poetry
Hera Lindsay Bird
Mary Oliver – particularly ‘Wild Geese’
Andrew McMillan – Physical
Podcasts
Harsh Reality: The Story of Miriam Rivera
Articles
Agrespect: Inspiring stories from LGBTQ+ people with rural lives and careers
The Tab: Finished It’s A Sin? Watch these films, docs and series to learn more about LGBT+ history