“We love and strongly recommend this beautifully curated book. Celebrating the massive and lasting
– Russell Tovey & Robert Diament, co-hosts of Talk Art podcast
global impact of LGBTQIA+ artists, a book like this is long overdue!”
QUEER ART From Canvas to Club, and the Spaces Between By Gemma Rolls-Bentley celebrates the LGBTQIA+ community with this vivid and dynamic collection of artworks that charts queer voices from around the world.
The twentieth century saw key shifts for the LGBTQIA+ community across the western world: from the Stonewall uprising to the first pride parades and homosexuality law reforms. The years following these milestone moments have seen queer life face new challenges, celebrations, injustices and liberations. As ever, this journey has been closely mapped by art and culture. Artists working across all mediums – from painting, performance, digital and beyond – have captured key moments impacting the LGBTQIA+ community, from the HIV/AIDS crisis and the rise of drag, to marriage equality and the fight for trans liberation.
The artists profiled in Queer Art include:
Leading artists David Hockney, Nicole Eisenmann and Zanele Muholi. Late greats Greer Lankton, Andy Warhol, Francis Bacon and Tom of Finland. Pioneers of Queer Cinema Derek Jarman and Sir Isaac Julien. Ground-breaking photographers Nan Goldin, Ajamu X, Wolfgang Tilmans and Catherine Opie. Contemporary art stars Sin Wai Kin, Zackary Drucker and Clifford Prince King. Instagram sensations Shantell Martin, Jwan Yosef and Matthew Stone. Andrew Logan, sculptor and founder of the Alternative Miss World party
With a heady curation of artworks selected by leading LGBTQIA+ curator Gemma Rolls-Bentley, this book mixes the high-brow with the low, gallery stalwarts with Instagram stars, and the racy with the fabulous. With over 150 works across thematic chapters covering Queer Spaces, Queer Bodies and Queer Power this is a unique celebration of queer life – a must-have for the LGBTQIA+ community, art lovers and anyone interested in the culture surrounding queer identity.
QUEER ART From Canvas to Club, and the Spaces Between By Gemma Rolls-Bentley
Foreword by Sir Isaac Julien Frances Lincoln |£25 ISBN: 978-0711282674 | Hardback & Ebook
£18.25 on Amazon
Gemma Rolls-Bentley has been at the forefront of contemporary art for almost two decades, working passionately to amplify the work of queer artists and provide a platform for art that explores LGBTQIA+ identity. She curates exhibitions, builds art collections and leads projects internationally. Most recently she curated the group exhibition ‘Dreaming of Home’ at Leslie Lohman Museum of Art in NYC and the Tom of Finland Art & Culture Festival in London. She curated the ‘Brighton Beacon Collection’, the largest permanent display of queer art in the UK. Gemma is a visiting lecturer at the Royal College of Art and
she has sat on the boards of numerous organisations and charities that support diversity in the arts.
Queer Art on Tour
June is going to be busy! After an event at Ajamu’s studio in Brixton and a launch in Brighton with Charity Kase, Gemma is taking the book up North and to Fire Island.
On the 5th of June, I’ll be at Ajamu X’s Studio in South London for a launch event hosted by Creative Resilience and 198 Studios. Ajamu and I will be in conversation and we’ll be joined by other artists from the book. If you’d like to come along please RSVP to michael.burgess@creative-resilience.org
I’ll be heading down to Brighton Beach House on the 9th June where I’ll be in conversation with performer, artist and star of Ru Paul’s Drag Race Charity Kase. Soho House members can book via the app and anyone else can get in touch for a (limited) guest list spot.
On June the 13th June, I’ll be heading up north to Manchester where we will be hosting the Northern launch of Queer Art at The Whitworth. I’ll be in conversation with Northern queer icon, artist and academic, Sarah Joy Ford.
On 14th June I’ll be speaking at cute and intimate event in Todmorden, the market town next to Hebden Bridge that’s become home to many queer creatives. I’ll be in conversation with Dr James Boaden at Imaginary Wines.
On 20th June, I’ll be back in New York for a book signing & dance party at Neue House. And then on the 23rd June I’ll be heading to my personal Queertopia – Fire Island – for a launch event at The Naughty Pine in collaboration with Boffo Artist Residency with live music by Torres, who appears in the book in a painting by her wife Jenna Gribbon.
Click on the blue links above to book the public events.
