The Columbus Museum of Art will be using virtual programming to host “A Look at Art after Stonewall” North America’s biggest LGBTQ collection. Credit: Courtesy of Melissa Ferguson
After the exhibition’s delay, “A Look at Art after Stonewall” is ready for Columbus’ eyes both in person and online, with an inside look at the exhibit coming Wednesday at 2 p.m.
“A Look at Art after Stonewall” is this week’s edition of the Columbus Museum of Art’s Wednesdays @ 2, a program that offers a behind-the-scenes look at exhibitions and the museum’s collections.
The event will include a discussion between Tyler Cann, head of exhibitions for CMOA and Pizzuti Family Curator of Contemporary Art, and Densil Porteous, interim executive and director of Stonewall Columbus, regarding the acclaimed exhibition “Art after Stonewall, 1969-1989,” and its convergence of political movements, art and social change, according to CMOA’s website.
The installment will focus on not only the dialogue around art in the LGBTQ community, but also themes from the exhibit, Cann said.
Cann said he hopes the dialogue will expose the history of struggle and the way visual art has been an outlet for the LGBTQ community and that people learn from the exhibition.
“What I hope and what I really hope for most exhibitions, people come away more empathetic, more understanding, more in touch with the perspective of people who aren’t like them,” Cann said.
The exhibit looks at the years 1969 — when the Stonewall uprising, a series of spontaneous and violent protests against police after a police raid on the Stonewall Inn, a popular gay club in New York City, happened — to 1989, highlighting the AIDS crisis, Melissa Ferguson, director of the CMOA’s marketing and communications, said.
The main themes featured in the exhibit try and encompass the whole LGBTQ community, one of which is Coming Out and its importance, Ferguson said. Other themes, such as Sexual Outlaws, focus on how the 1960s sexual revolution energized people and shifted social norms, whereas in the theme Use of Erotica, artists depict erotica as power.
Other themes of the exhibit relate to sexual freedom include Things are Queer, A as in Activism and Gender Play, which features a painting by David Hockney called “Divine,” which the museum describes as a “luminous painting of character actor Glenn Milstead, better known by his drag name, Divine.”
“A Look at Art After Stonewall,” will take place Wednesday at 2 p.m. Viewers can join by going to CMOA’s website and clicking on events and programs, where information on tickets can be found. An invitation will then be sent via email.
