Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And so is queerness. In 2024, major art institutions are making space for LGBTQ2S+ artists like never before.
Of course, the Venice Biennale will be the place where the global art world gathers—that is, the monied global art world. But Los Angeles is making a play to be known as a top queer art destination, hosting not one but two career retrospectives of important LGBTQ2S+ artists. Here are some other hot spots to see the queerest art exhibitions in the world.
Venice, Italy
Venice Biennale
April 20 to November 24, 2024
When this massive and massively important exhibition is happening, it garners more attention than pretty much any other art event in the world. The 60th annual biennale is being curated by out gay Brazilian Adriano Pedrosa, and its theme, Stranieri Ovunque–Foreigners Everywhere, makes a lot of room for LGBTQ+ artists. From the news release announcing this theme: “The figure of the foreigner is associated with the stranger, the straniero, the estranho, the étranger, and thus the exhibition unfolds and focuses on the production of other related subjects: the queer artist, who has moved within different sexualities and genders, often being persecuted or outlawed; the outsider artist, who is located at the margins of the art world, much like the autodidact and the so-called folk artist; as well as the Indigenous artist, frequently treated as a foreigner in their own land.”
Among the LGBTQ+ artists to be included are Jeffrey Gibson, the first Indigenous artist to represent the U.S. at the biennale, and Eimear Walshe, who will represent Ireland. At multiple venues all over the city.
Melbourne, Australia
Midsumma: Queer PHOTO
January 27 to March 24, 2024
Melbourne’s Pride celebrations, called Midsumma, are as artsy as Sydney’s Mardi Gras is flashy. Although there will be LGBTQ+ art all over the city for the festival itself, which this year runs January 21 to February 11, its multi-venue Queer PHOTO program, probably the largest component, has some shows staying up until March and beyond. “Queer PHOTO: Surfacing” includes four artists focusing on the queer diaspora experience, while “Queer PHOTO: Affirm” presents a work by Peter Waples Crowe, based on his adoption and his later reconnection with his Ngarigo heritage. The Zizi Show explores the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and drag performance. At multiple venues all over the city.
Hong Kong
Art Basel Hong Kong (ABHK)
March 28 to 30, 2024
With 242 participating galleries from 40 countries and territories, this flagship Asian art event has bounced back to its pre-pandemic size and scope. Because most of the work is presented by private galleries—it’s for art buyers as much as it is for art lovers—it’s a little hard to predict exactly where queer content will pop up—but pop up it will. PTT Space gallery from Taipei, Taiwan, is bringing paintings by the late master Shiy De-jinn Shiy, whose homoerotic portraits from the 1950s to the ’70s influenced a generation of artists. At The Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (1 Expo Dr., Wan Chai, Hong Kong).
Los Angeles, California
Mickalene Thomas: All About Love
May 25 to September 29, 2024
Leave it to L.A.’s curatorially astute The Broad museum to produce the first major international touring exhibition dedicated to work by pioneering out lesbian Black artist Mickalene Thomas. With more than 80 works created over the last 20 years, the show is sure to be a blockbuster, touching on “notions of beauty … sexuality and politics, powerfully bringing visibility to those who have historically been excluded and marginalized in art history.” Her images of Black women are rich in colour and texture—rhinestones abound. Thomas often places her figures in the context of the Western canon by having them in poses used by 19th century French painters like Henri Matisse and Édouard Manet. At The Broad (221 S. Grand Ave., Los Angeles, California).
Los Angeles, California
John Waters: Pope of Trash
Closes August 4, 2024
A shocked moviegoer coming out of a screening of Pink Flamingos in 1972, having just watched drag queen Divine scarf down doggie poo, would find it hard to believe that the film’s director would, 50 years later, be honoured with such a thoughtful and affectionate tribute to his scandalous life’s work. But John Waters, gay troublemaker though he is, is a loveable and influential character, bringing outrageous queer culture to the screen decades before it was acceptable. This comprehensive exhibition includes costumes, set decoration, props, handwritten scripts, posters, correspondence, scrapbooks, photographs and film clips. At the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures (6067 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, California).
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Martin Wong: Malicious Mischief
Closes April 1, 2024
This major retrospective of work by the late gay Chinese-American artist Martin Wong, who died in 1999 from AIDS-related illness, captures the chaotic politics and pleasure of three decades of U.S. gay culture from a distinctive outsider perspective. Against the backdrops of San Francisco and New York, Wong captured the gritty realities of city life with playfulness and heart. From November to January, the show is at Stedelijk Museum at the same time as an exhibit by Nan Goldin, whose photos have chronicled so much of contemporary queer culture—together they make a great pairing. But Wong is worth a visit on his own merit. After stops in Madrid, Berlin and London, it’s at Stedelijk Museum (Museumplein 10, Amsterdam).
London, United Kingdom
Barbie: The Exhibition
July 5, 2024, to February 23, 2025
Yes, everybody’s been jumping on the Barbie bandwagon since Greta Gerwig’s Barbie movie took the world by storm in 2023. But this major exhibition, created through a partnership with Mattel, Inc. to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the Barbie brand, promises to be the dream house of Barbie worship. In order to map the profoundly pink Barbie legacy since its founding in 1959, the curators were granted “special access” to dozens of rare and unique items. The focus will, of course, be on Barbie design—her body, the clothes and the accessories—but LGBTQ+ attendees should be able to insert their queer ideas into the experience. At The Design Museum (224–238 Kensington High Street, London).
