Queer as German Folk
The project "Queer as German Folk" took the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprisings as an occasion to examine the current status of the gender diversity discourse on the basis of the history of the Queer Movement. It focused in particular on the German LGBTQI* movements generated by the respective civil societies. It was also intended to correct historical perspectives and to question a traditional cis-male narrative.
In the participating Goethe-Instituts in Montreal, Toronto, Chicago, New York, Washington, San Francisco and Mexico City, as well as the Goethe-Zentrum Guadalajara, the centerpiece of the commemorative event series was an exhibition developed in collaboration with the Schwules Museum, Berlin. With approx. 100 objects, it was intended to create a space of experience that allows visitors to learn about the history and present of movement.
In Chicago the exhibition were shown in three parts and neighborhoods: on the Southside at the Packingtown Museum at The Plant in Back of the Yards, in the Loop at the Goethe-Institut Chicago, on the Northside at the Leather Archives and Museum in Edgewater.
Further components of the project in Chicago were:
- The film series Queer as German Folk, celebrating the 35th anniversary of Edition Salzgeber, one of the most important LGBTQI* film distributers in Germany, at Chicago Filmmakers/Reeling in Andersonville.
- A website to provide background information, documentation of the exhibition stations the video series Stonewall moments,
- Spotify playlist.
Birgit Bosold has been a member of the Schwules Museum Berlin Board of Directors since 2006. She was instrumental in the strategic reorientation of the Schwules Museum also by means of (co-)curating exhibitions. She was project manager and co-curator of the exhibition "Homosexuality_en", which was initiated by the Schwules Museum* and shown in cooperation with the Deutschen Historischen Museum. Most recently, together with Vera Hofmann, she was project manager for the Jahr der Frau_en - a queer feminist annual program of the Gay Museum for 2018.
Carina Klugbauer is a research assistant at the Schwules Museum Berlin. In 2017 she was involved in the conception and curating of the travelling exhibition "Unverschämt" (shameless) on the persecution and discrimination of lesbian women and gay men in Hesse. In 2018, together with Birgit Bosold, she curated the queer art exhibition "Lesbisches Sehen" for the annual program Jahr der Frau_en.
Queer as German Folk is a project of the Goethe-Institutes in North America in cooperation with the Schwules Museum, Berlin, and the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung.
With support of the following local partners:
