Two Chicagoans are working to bring a new business—one part coffee shop, one part co-working space, one-part events venue—centering Black and queer identities to Lake View. Co-founder M. Rashaad Barnett said he envisions the business, to be named Take Up Space, as “a leader in co-working and community that defies the need for barriers of […]
Category: BIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Posted inArts
David Archuleta may have lost “The Masked Singer” but he’s winning life
David Archuleta is easily the sweetest of crooners. His warm, romantic, sweet voice has charmed a breadth of audiences for more than a decade, first as a top contender on season seven of “American Idol,” and most recently with his boyish face completely hidden on “The Masked Singer.” In both competitions, he beat out dozens […]
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Anastasia-Renée’s “Side Notes from the Archivist”
Anastacia-Renée is an award-winning writer, educator, interdisciplinary artist, TEDx speaker, 2020 Arc Fellow (4Culture), Jack Straw Curator, podcaster, and served as Seattle’s Civic Poet. Her fascinating new book of poetry is called “Side Notes from the Archivist.” As the title implies, the book is a historical document that provides insight into five decades of American […]
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Pride with Pretty Boi Drag: A unique performance
Drag king performer Pretty Rik E and the rest of the Pretty Boi Drag troupe have made it their mission to turn you on and give you the performance of a lifetime that is “sensual, inclusive and safe,” with what they claim is ‘D.C.’s Best Drag Show.’ In 2016, Pretty Rik E started Pretty Boi Drag with […]
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Patric McCoy exhibition unearths forgotten moments from Chicago’s Black queer history
It’s the unusual person who is able to transform their commutes to and from their office into anything meaningful, let alone a profound body of work documenting a generation. But Patric McCoy has done just that. McCoy, a retired scientist as well as an art collector, spent years carrying his 35mm camera on his bike […]
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Joanna McClintick’s ode to children and queer resistance
Together we are strong, is the unifying message of Joanna McClintick’s debut children’s book “Twas the Night Before Pride,” based on a poem McClintick wrote when they were still hoping to start their own family. As they prepared to become a parent, they found it increasingly problematic that most of the children’s books they encountered, […]
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Baruch Porras Hernandez: Multiple mediums, infinite joy
Baruch Porras Hernandez’s art encompasses everything from the written word to web comics and standup comedy to slam poetry. Dubbed a “Multi Hypenated Artist” by the San Francisco Chronicle, he was born in Toluca, Mexico and raised in the Bay Area. He moved to San Francisco in 2006 and continues to create art while also […]
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Terry Loftis: Building a rainbow bridge between classical music and the LGBTQ+ community
Terry Loftis has been described as a “rainmaker” for the arts, and that description certainly fit his time leading The Arts Community Alliance, the organization that doles out grants to area arts organizations and has been helping theaters, dance companies and the like rebuild their foundations post COVID. But these days, the out arts advocate […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Young filmmaker Emerson Basco is coming for the status-quo
From GAP ad star to filmmaker, Emerson Basco, 13-years-old, has already directed her first short film and screened it at Outfest Fusion Film Festival this spring and the San Diego Filipino Film Festival in 2021. Basco directed her first film “Can We Play” when she was only 11-years-old. And it’s not just any film, it’s […]
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Art-felt: Chicago’s Pearl Dick helps young victims of trauma through glassblowing
Almost a decade ago, glass artist Pearl Dick and clinical psychologist Dr. Brad Stolbach co-founded Project FIRE (Fearless Initiative for Recovery and Empowerment)—an arts program that provides victims of trauma the chance to heal through glassblowing. Program components include mentoring, art and psychoeducation. Project FIRE (in partnership with Healing Hurt People-Chicago, a hospital-based violence-intervention program) […]
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Director makes queer art for the stage in the big city and the suburbs
North Texas is never short on performing arts. With symphonies, operas, dance and theater flourishing in abundance throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth area, there are always plenty of options for entertainment onstage. And the suburbs are no exception, especially with one area theatrical director finding ways to celebrate diversity and inclusion in the smaller cities as […]
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Chef Marcu: Bridging the gap between Black trans people and the culinary industry
When Chef Marcu, also known as Marcuz James, first started his private catering business Palate Marcu: International Kitchen in 2019, he felt like he was thrown into a pool of cold water when he agreed to cater for 500 people at the Philadelphia Trans Wellness Conference. “I had no idea what I was doing,” Marcu […]
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Monica Palacios stands up and out
“Just comadres? I don’t think so,” is one of the many brilliant lines Monica Palacios has delivered onstage, commenting on Mexican women singing passionate mariachi songs together. Named one of the most influential Latinx performers ever, Monica Palacios was born to be a comedian. She was one of the first out Chicana lesbian comics to […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Artist Kitoko Mai explores dissociative identity disorder through art
Meet Kitoko Mai. Mai is a Black, non-binary, disabled, emerging multidisciplinary performance artist, originally from Democratic Republic of the Congo. Mai’s pronouns are she/her and they/them. Also, meet Cheyenne, Niles, and Annie. They are three separate and distinct personalities, but they all exist within Kitoko Mai. As a multidisciplinary artist, Mai engages audiences in art […]
Posted inTop Stories
Drag performers of color reflect on ‘queer joy’ – and the current backlash to their art
With roots stretching back thousands of years, drag performers have recently become a cultural Rorschach test. Just as the art form has catapulted into mainstream spaces – thanks, RuPaul – it has elicited fear in cultural conservatives, who, as the Bay Area Reporter has been reporting, are seeking to limit its public visibility through state […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Aeryanah Von Moi: Finding liberation through theater
Aeryanah Von Moi has lived in Philadelphia for 27 years and has had a wealth of creative and professional experiences, including as an assistant to Family Court Judge Tiffany Palmer, where she still works. But it was acting that liberated her “in so many different ways.” Von Moi’s experience in theater began in the early […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Fabrizzio Subia navigates loss and grief through art
When it comes to loss, Fabrizzio Subia may know more about that than most people. Having dealt with everything from familial loss to the erasure of his history, the Ecuadorian-American multidisciplinary artist (who has also done things like host the open-mic event Tortas y Talento) has unveiled the video installation “Año Nuevo (2023)”—a grief performance […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Chicago video game developer seeks to increase Black queer representation
Dani LaLonders (she/they) vividly remembers when “Lizzie McGuire: On the Go” first came out on the Gameboy Advance in 2004, joking that she was “probably one of five people” who played the game. The Chicago-based creator holds fond memories of various video games that inspired her throughout her childhood. “I played a lot of girly […]
Posted inArts and Entertainment
Asha Santee is creating queer healing through art
Asha Santee has always had a creative spirit, but becoming a full-time artist was never her plan. She landed here by accident. After growing up in California and then Houston, she came to Washington, D.C. to attend Howard University on a basketball scholarship. Her goal was to play professional basketball and she even tried out […]
Posted inBIPOC LGBTQ+ Artist Spotlight
Roadwork reflects on its herstory to plan its future
In 1978, amid the second wave of feminism in the aftermath of Roe v. Wade, Roadwork – a multiracial coalition – put women’s art, particularly that of women of color, on the road. Building the roads where they didn’t already exist, Roadwork created an intersection of opportunity and social change, wherein artists from diverse backgrounds […]