WEST HOLLYWOOD, May 19, 2016 – Each year, the City of West Hollywood celebrates the artistic contributions of the LGBTQ community with its vibrant One City One Pride arts festival. The festival runs for 40 days, from Harvey Milk Day, Sunday, May 22, 2016 through Thursday, June 30, 2016, which marks the end of Pride month.
This year, the One City One Pride LGBTQ Arts Festival celebrates pride and explores the locations and history of LGBTQ activism with the theme “Into the Streets,” which is based on an early LGBTQ rights rallying cry, “Out of the closet and into the streets!”
A complete list of One City One Pride arts festival events is available at www.weho.org/pride.
Highlights of this year’s One City One Pride are:
1) Harvey Milk Day Screening: Milk — Harvey Milk was the first openly gay person to be elected to a major U.S. public office. Starring Sean Penn, Milk follows the last eight years of Harvey Milk’s life, from New York to San Francisco’s Castro neighborhood, where he became an advocate for gay and human rights, to his election and assassination and the legacy he left behind. The free screening will take place on Sunday, May 22, 2016 at 3 p.m. in the City of West Hollywood’s City Council Chambers/Public Meeting Room at West Hollywood Library, located at 625 N. San Vicente Boulevard. RSVPs are requested.
2) Stuart Timmons’ LGBTQ History Tour — Stuart Timmons, co-author of “Gay LA,” suffered a stroke before his West Hollywood LGBTQ History Tour was completed. Thanks to a team of helpers and with support from a grant from the City of West Hollywood through One City One Pride, the tour will be restaged with a cast of colorful characters from different eras stationed along the route. Tours, which are approximately 90 minutes, will depart every 15 minutes from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, June 4, 2016 from West Hollywood Park, located at 647 N. San Vicente Boulevard — groups will meet in the loading-zone area on the west side of N. San Vicente Boulevard just north of the West Hollywood Auditorium and Library. After the tour, visitors can drop by the Army of Lovers “Queer Liberation Activation Station” to unleash their inner activist in an artist-led workshop from 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. also in West Hollywood Park, located at 647 N. San Vicente Boulevard.
3) Hollywood Fringe / One City One Pride — The Hollywood Fringe Festival, which runs fromThursday, June 9, 2016 through Sunday, June 26, 2016 is an open and uncensored community-derived event. This year, through a special collaboration with the City of West Hollywood, the Fringe’s Western border extends into West Hollywood with LGBTQ shows taking place throughout the city as part of the One City One Pride festival. Times, dates, locations, and ticket prices vary.
4) What Did Robert Mapplethorpe Teach Us? J. Paul Getty Museum curator Paul Martineau, fine-arts photographer Catherine Opie, LACMA curator Britt Salvesen, and painter and Yale art historian Jonathan Weinberg will discuss how Robert Mapplethorpe changed photography and the perception of photography as art during this Zócalo/Getty “Open Art” panel discussion hosted by the City of West Hollywood’s WeHo Arts on Wednesday, June 8, 2016 at 7:30 p.m. at the City of West Hollywood’s City Council Chambers/Public Meeting Room at West Hollywood Library, located at 625 N. San Vicente Boulevard. Admission is free and is open to the public, although RSVPs are necessary This event is concurrent with a major retrospective of his work.
5) A Brief History of Drag — On view through Monday, June 27, 2016, this exhibit at the West Hollywood Library, located at 625 N. San Vicente Boulevard, is an overview of the history of drag in Los Angeles and West Hollywood, and examines the importance of drag queens and others in the early LGBTQ rights movement. The exhibit is comprised of historic photographs from the ONE Archives, as well as more recent photographs taken by photographer Austin Young. A Brief History of Drag is curated by Katie Poltz and Jessica Fowler of the LA LGBT Center and David Attyah of Glendale Community College; it is a collaboration of the City of West Hollywood through WeHo Arts, the LA LGBT Center, and Center for Performing Arts at UCLA. Admission is free during library open hours.
One City One Pride is organized by the City of West Hollywood through WeHo Arts — the City’s Arts & Cultural Affairs Commission and the City’s Arts & Economic Development Division — through an open process, with input from the City’s Lesbian & Gay Advisory Board, Transgender Advisory Board, and other community partners. This year, One City One Pride is additionally supported through a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).
For additional information the One City One Pride LGBTQ Arts Festival please visitwww.weho.org/pride or contact Michael Che, the City of West Hollywood’s Economic Development and Cultural Affairs Coordinator, at (323) 848-6377 or at mche@weho.org. For people who are deaf or hearing impaired, please call (323) 848-6496.
