Caribbean LGBTQ Activism Honored
Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning hosts exhibition
BY PAUL SCHINDLER
“Queer Caribbeans
of NYC/ Stonewall
50,” a multi-media
online exhibition
providing an historical retrospective
of Caribbean-American LGBTQ
activism, is online at jcal.org/
queercaribbeans through September
7.
The exhibition is an extensive
repository of photographs, posters,
portraits, and interviews with respected
Caribbean LGBTQ activists
including Dominique Jackson,
a star of “Pose,” Colin Robinson, a
poet who founded and directs the
Coalition Advocating for the Inclusion
of Sexual Orientation (CAISO),
Kim Watson, co-founder of Community
Kinship Life (CK Life), Tina
Arniotis, founder of Chutney Pride,
and Mohamed Q. Amin, founder
and executive director of the Caribbean
The founding of the Caribbean Equality Project in 2015 in response to hate violence against the community
is one of the stories told through this exhibition.
Equality Project (CEP).
The project, a year-long endeavor
curated by Amin and Kadeem Robinson,
also of CEP, puts LGBTQ
PHOTO JCAL.ORG
activism into the larger context of
Caribbean-American history, emphasizin
such activism has always
been part of that bigger story.
ONLINE GALLERY
The current exhibition is the result
of a partnership between CEP,
a Queens-based group that works
to empower the marginalized voices
of LGBTQ people of Caribbean
origin and descent, and the Jamaica
Center for Arts and Learning
(JCAL), a multidisciplinary
arts center in Southeast Queens
that has provided quality visual,
performing, and literary arts since
1972.
The exhibition debuted last year
as part of the Stonewall 50 celebrations
at the LGBT Community
Center in Manhattan.
“‘Queer Caribbeans of NYC’ not
only speaks to our inclusive values
at JCAL but to our confi dence that
even online-only, we can proudly
stand with the LGBTQ+ community
in Queens and amplify their
stories and their history,” Courtney
Ffrench, JCAL’s interim artistic director
said in a written statement.
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Bill de Blasio
Mayor
Oxiris Barbot, MD
Commissioner
GayCityNews.com | August 27 - September 9, 2020 29
/jcal.org
/JCAL.ORG
/GayCityNews.com
