What better way to celebrate Brighton & Hove officially being the queer capital of the UK than by having TWO exhibitions of portraits of our community?
After a successful Kickstarter fundraising campaign, and with the support of Ironworks Studios Brighton and the LGBTQ Workers’ Forum, I am delighted to announce TWO exhibitions of The Identity Project for LGBTQ+ History Month.
The IDENTITY Project – A Portrait of a Community by award-winning photographer Chris Jepson is an exploration of what it means to identify as a member of the LGBTQ+ community today.
After more than 20 years working for various LGBTQ+ media, the project was conceived in 2019 to redress the unhealthy bias of the visual narrative in mainstream media that LGBTQ+ people look a certain way.
This project and its exhibitions are a superb way of raising awareness of the real diversity of LGBTQ+ communities across the city and wider UK, as well as supporting inclusion across the city. They also raise interesting questions around the media’s representations of LGBTQ+ communities, and how that can be challenged and changed using honest representation drawn from all intersecting groups that are experienced as part of LGBTQ+ lives.
Supporters can still donate towards the the ongoing work thru either PayPal or Ko-Fi
EXHIBITION DETAILS:
- Jubilee Library MAP
06-26 February 2023 • Jubilee St • Brighton BN1 1GE - Plus X Innovation Hub MAP
February/March 2023 • Lewes Road • Brighton BN2 4GL
The Identity Project – Brighton & Hove Edition was published as a zine in December 2022 but this is the first time the 90 portraits will come together in one exhibition. Many of the participants have intersectional identities and experiences of marginalisation, for example, LGBTQ+ people of colour or LGBTQ+ people with disabilities, and many of the 90 are activists, who have fought for the inclusion and rights of LGBTQ+ people over the past 5 decades.