City of Detroit's Office of Arts, Culture and Entrepreneurship partners with Mighty Real Queer Detroit to host the nation's largest exhibit of work by LGBTQ+ Artists
City of Detroit's Office of Arts, Culture, and Entrepreneurship partners with Mighty Real Queer Detroit to host the nation's largest exhibit of work by LGBTQ+ Artists
- 150+ fine artists and 40+ performing artists will appear at 17 venues across the city to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Detroit PRIDE, June 2-30, 2022
The City of Detroit is partnering with Mighty Real/Queer Detroit (MRQD), a not-for-profit organization committed to promoting positive and meaningful images of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer community, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Detroit PRIDE with exhibits featuring more than 700 works of art by 150+ artists in 17 venues across the city.
This project, which is presented in partnership with the Office of Arts, Culture, and Entrepreneurship, will be the largest exhibit showing the range and depth of Detroit queer art ever assembled in the nation. It also will feature more than 40 performing artists. The Ford Foundation is the Presenting Sponsor.
“Mayor Mike Duggan has made clear that it is our duty as public servants to ensure opportunities for all residents to have everything they need to thrive in work, education and joy,” said Rochelle Riley, the city’s Director of Arts and Culture. “That includes ways to show and experience a diverse array of arts and culture. We want our entire community to take part in all the excellence offered by our creative workforce.”
Mighty Real/Queer Detroit also will address loss and remembrance by including significant, rarely seen, and unexhibited art objects. For the first time, works by artists who died of AIDS in the 1980s and '90s will be exhibited. Those works include never-before-seen work by Brian Buczak, Timothy Gass, Marcus Mannino, and Constantine Tsatsanis. MRQD also will host a special tribute to the legendary Detroit artist LeRoy Foster and to poets Beth Brant and Terri Jewell.
With support from the Ford Foundation, Kresge Arts in Detroit, Aaron Family Foundation, College for Creative Studies, and the Ruth Ellis Center, the exhibits will be the hallmark of a June 2022 Pride Month celebration that also includes panels discussions, essays, and performances all designed to inspire reflection and discussion. The exhibition will highlight the diversity of the LGBTQ+ Detroit community and aims to empower, affirm, and transcend.
Among the artists to be featured in the Pride exhibits are: Austė, Robbie Aaron, Austin Ackles, Charles Alexander, Paula Allen, Elliot Avis, Batoul Ballout, Audrey Banks, Tanner Blackwell, Joan Jett-Blakk, Tommye Blount, John Briggs, Emmy Bright, Jeff Britting, Jan Brown, Shawntai Brown, Brian Buczak, Patrick Bunyan, Mark McDaniel Burton, patrick burton, Brian Carpenter, Shudi Chen, Feather Chiaverini, Aki Choklat, Seuil Chung, Justin Coleman, Michael Connelly, Andrea Costantini, Robert Craner, Stephanie Crawford, Christopher Cushman, Cyrah Dardas, Carl Demeulenaere, Sam Dienst, Julio Dominguez, Demario Dotson, Stephen Dueweke, Kaiden Dunn, Bakpak Durden, Iris Eichenberg, Gary Eleinko, Brett Evans, Danielle Eve, LeRoy Foster, Rebecca Frantz, Timothy Gass, Neil Gates, Carl George, Bill Girard, Stephanie Glazier, Javier Gonzalez, Brenda Goodman, Loralee Grace, Nickie Gunning, Michael Gute, John Gutoskey, Katy Hait, Boswell Hardwick, Eugene Harris, Jefre Harwoods, Bryan Hoffman, Stephanie Holloway, Erin Brott-Holtzman, Holly Hughes, Johnny Ray Huston, Richard Jerzy, Ray Johnson, Carmichael Jones, Andrew Jordan, Urban Jupena, Alvaro Jurado, Kira Keck, Deborah Kingery, Howard Kottler, Paul Kotula, Brian Kovach, Em Lane, Maura Latty, Marcus Leatherdale, Richard Lewis, Yang Li, Tom Livo, Jim Lucky, Ron Madalinski, Marcus Mannino, Darrin Marzorati, Renee McCoy, Ian McLaughlin, Annie Meyer, Billy Miller, Levon Millross, Monica Molinaro, Mothercyborg, Jeremy Noonan, Merel Noorlander, Scott Northrup, Kiwi Phong Nguyen, Kasper Ray O'Brien, Matthew Papa, Jerome Patryjak, Gintė Peciura, Henry Petrucci, Maureen Petrucci, Leslie Ann Pilling, Rachel Pontious, Gordon Price, Mieyoshi Ragernoir, Lester Rambus, Nathan Rapport, Deborah Rockman, Joyce Sabit, Julie Sabit, Ackeem Salmon, Peggy Sauer, Tylonn Sawyer, Andromeda Schmidt, Anthony Smith, Daniel Smith, Deidre D.S.SENSE Smith, Gregory Sobieraj, Peter Sparling, Karianne Spens-Hanna, James Stephens, Joe Sposita, Jon Strand, Jack O. Summers, Brian Szeto, Jarad Tacon-Heaslip, Jeremy Tacon-Heaslip, Joyce Tinkham, Charzette Torrence, Christian Trippe, Constantinos (Gus) Tsatsanis, Virgil Vogel, April Walker, Patrick Webb, Kevin Weeder, Frederick Weston, Jack Whitehead, Vagner Whitehead, Tony Whitfield, Levester Williams, Ellen Wieske, Scott Wistinghausen, Sophia Wojnovich, Cherry Wood, S. Kay Young, Meg Foley.
Participating galleries are:
Collected Detroit, Chuck Duquet
Galerie Camille, Dalia Reyes
N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art
Anton Art Center, Stephanie Hazard sahazzard@theartcenter.org Detroit Artists Market, Gary Eleinko geleinko02@comcast.net David Klein Gallery https://www.dkgallery.com Hatch Art, Chris Schneider artguy@schneida.com Norwest Gallery, Asia Hamilton info@norwestgallery.com Public Pool, Maria Prainito-Winczner prainitomaria@gmail.com Scarab Club, Treena Flannery Ericson tericson@scarabclub.org Playground Detroit, Paulina info@playgrounddetroit.com Ruth Ellis Center, Jerry Peterson jerry.peterson@ruthelliscenter.org M Contemporary Art, Melannie Chard mc@mcontemporaryart.com Metropolitan Museum of Design Detroit, Leslie Ann Pilling leslie@presenceiiproductions.com Cass Cafe, Dave Roberts nativegreen@hotmail.com 333 Midland, Mike Ross 333midland@gmail.com
Michael Andrews Studio
In conjunction with the exhibition, MRQD and Detroit ACE will create a calendar of events highlighting panel discussions, artist talks, performances, and poetry readings that will be issued to all media.
MRQD can be found online and on social, on Instagram @mightyrealqueerdetroit, Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/MRQD2022/
