Visible and Invisible Queerness in the City
An evening with Jaime Starr of Queer Britain, the UK's national LGBTQ+ Museum and researcher Colin Keays. Organised in collaboration with Queer Built - an initiative of queer spatial professionals in the Netherlands. Friday 06 November, 19:00 - 22:00.
Tickets available for 5 euro.
Queerness and queer culture are deeply connected to the development of the modern city, shaping urban life in both visible and invisible ways. From 18th- and 19th-century European port cities such as Rotterdam, and Newcastle, where sailors and dockworkers found companionship in taverns, inns, and lodging houses after long periods at sea, to the “Roaring Twenties” where queer culture flourished in cabarets, theatres, and dance venues, cities have long provided spaces for connection, creativity, and self-expression. In the 1960s and 1970s, queer communities transformed urban spaces into places of resistance and collective identity, inspiring new social institutions, cultural venues, and political organisations and which legacy continues today in queer neighbourhoods all around the western world.
For this lecture evening, we have teamed up with the Queer Built initiative to explore the visible and hidden queer histories that have shaped our cities. Together with researcher and collection manager Jaime Starr from the UK’s national LGBTQ+ museum Queer Britain, and researcher and writer Colin Keys, we will uncover stories of queer neighborhoods, secret meeting places, cruising grounds, chosen families, and shared homes as spaces that have fostered connection, care, and resistance throughout urban history.
Programme
19:30 – 20:00 Doors open, drinks
20:00 – 20:20 Welcome by Independent school for the City and Queer Built
20:20 – 21:00 Presentation by Jaime Starr
21:00 – 21:40 Presentation by Colin Keays
21:40 – 22:00 Conversation between speakers and the audience
22:00 – 00:00 Drinks and aftertalk
About Jaime Starr
Jaime (they/them) is a curator and historian, with a focus on LGBTQIA+ history in the UK in the 20th century, curently working on their PHD research at newcaslte university on queer alternative archiving. In addition they are collections manager at the Queer Britain Museum in London and as an associate curator for Queer Heritage South in Brighton.
About Colin Keays
Colin is a writer, editor and curator, currently based in Amsterdam (NL). He is digital editor at BUTT Magazine, editor-in-chief of OtherNetwork, a global platform researching independent cultural production, and in 2023 he co-founded and edited the first issue of W’AHU, a new magazine celebrating queer creatives in Accra, Ghana. In 2023 he was commissioned by Nieuwe Instituut to curate the Dutch Pavilion at the London Design Biennale, which was awarded with a special mention from the professional jury. Colin holds a BA in Architecture from the Manchester School of Architecture and an MA in Contextual Design from Design Academy Eindhoven (2019), where he teaches in the BA Studio Digital-Native.
About Queer Built
Queer Built is a network of queer spatial professionals in the Netherlands, that promote inclusive architecture and aims to give voice to queer perspectives in the built environment and beyond. Open to everyone interested in architecture from a queer perspective, the initiative organises various events throughout the year, from film screenings to excursions and from lectures to informal get-togethers.