Queering the Burton

York museums Trust (YMT), specifically York Art Gallery (YAG) and York LGBT Forum have formed a partnership, the Queering Group, with an aim to broaden the stories being told within YAG’s collections, enabling greater inclusion and social justice/equality for the LGBTQ+ community.

As a precursor to the Bloomsbury exhibition scheduled for 2022 at YAG, a group famous for their unconventional relationships with one another, this initiative with York’s LGBT Forum group will focus on the reinterpretation of some of our own works in the permanent collection.

We aim to work within the heritage organisation to uncover, understand and interpret the lives of people linked to the site as collectors/artists/craftspeople, who challenged conventions of sexuality and gender diversity. In answer to this we have formed the Queering Group. The use of Queer in the groups title is a positive affirmation. As a definition Queer has a number of meanings, and in this instance, our aim is to de-weaponize the term Queer, a reclaimed slur that we use positively as an inclusive word for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities.

York LGBT Forum have created a handy guide to commonly used terminology, view it here.

Upcoming events

Experience York Art Gallery in a whole new light this half-term at our Curious Takeover!

Saturday 26th February11am – 4pm (activities scheduled throughout)Free!

In partnership with Curious Arts

Join us as we celebrate families of all shapes and sizes through colourful, creative activities inspired by the gallery itself, in celebration of LGBT History Month and The Queering the Burton Project. The activites are mainly aimed at ages 4-7 years and their families – but there will be something for everyone. Find out more here

Spotlight Talks

In celebration of LGBT History Month, and our newly opened Queering the Burton exhibition at York Art Gallery, join our VE team for a spotlight talk from 2pm each Saturday in February. Our “Art Shot” LGBT tour is free, lasting approximately 20 mins.

Past Events:

Communities that Create (Part 2)
16 January / 10am-1pm and 1:30pm-4:30pm

In the Spirit of the Omega workshop, where the collective was key, and artists worked together, we are inviting members of the LGBTQI+ community and Allies to join us at York Art Gallery in a communities that create ‘collective’ painting workshop. In this session, Part 2, we will be working in the style of the Rebel Arts Centre. Find out more here.

Communities that Create (Part 1)
Sunday 5th December / 10am-1pm and 1:30pm-4:30pm

In the Spirit of the Omega workshop, where the collective was key, and artists worked together, we are inviting members of the LGBTQI+ community and Allies to join us at York Art Gallery in a communities that create ‘collective’ painting workshop. The Omega workshop, whose Bloomsbury artists brought abstract shapes and bold colours from modern art into designs for the home, will be our inspiration. Find out more here.

Queer your Labels!
Saturday 27th November 2021 / 1:30 pm – 4:30 pm

How can we use our identities and experiences to reveal stories often made invisible? How can we navigate using current LGBTQI terms for historical figures and artists? And what does it even mean to represent your gender identity and expression in an artwork – or its label? Join curator and educator Claire Mead to look at objects in the collection from a queer angle. Find out more here.

Our Voices
Saturday 23^rd October 2021 / 10am-1pm

Becky Gee, Curator of Fine Art and Sas Greenwood, Creative Learning Producer, will be on hand to guide participants through a “look behind the scenes” in our store, take in a tour of the Burton Gallery, ending in a session focussing on label creation. Find out more here.

How to Queer a Museum with Matt Smith
Saturday 30 October / 1:30 pm – 4:00 pm

Drawing on two of his exhibitions– Queering the Museum at Birmingham Museum and Losing Venus at the Pitt Rivers Museum – this session will explore how Matt has interrogated and subverted museum displays to allow queerness and LGBTQI+ lives to come to light, and questions whether the museum space is a good space to be queer. Find out more here.

Queering Workshop with Community Curator Stephen Welsh, author of the article; The Hypermasculine Museum.
Saturday 25 September / 10am – 1pm

Having an understanding of how collecting institutions, and their associated spaces have historically promoted heteronormativity and heterosexism is vital to have in any Queering project. Providing this analytical framework ensures that the process of Queering can address residual forms of prejudice and potentially have greater organisational impact beyond just collections.

If you are from the LGBTQI+ Community or an Allie, we encourage you to join us in this workshop. There will be a short presentation about Stephen’s Queering practice, before participants break into groups to identify, investigate and invert how heteronormativity is projected in a preselected artwork from the Gallery’s collection. Find out more here.