Gay artists Think Pink for World AIDS Day
Hastings, home of the saucy postcard, will be raising eyebrows once more this December with the launch of a major new art exhibition, Think Pink, bringing together a bevy of the UK’s leading gay artists.
Opening on World Aids Day, December 1st, the show challenges near-neighbour Brighton’s seaside gay monopoly by combining art with key messages on safer sex and modern gay life.
Sponsored by nightclub “Trade”, the exhibition hosts seven gay artists, including Andrew Logan (creator of the Alternative Miss World), TradeMark (famous for his pioneering fliers for gay nightclubs Trade and Heaven) and Nigel Grimmer, curator of the gay doll museum.
In case an art centre full of gay men isn’t fun enough, the show will be opened at a gala event by Andy Bell, lead singer of pop legends Erasure, a frequent visitor to the eccentric seaside town and probably the world’s most famous openly HIV-positive artist.
The show will be running for one week at the south coast’s trendy new art spot, The Arts Forum, and half of all proceeds will be donated to Terrence Higgins Trust.
But the show’s message isn’t just about gay art. The local NHS Primary Care Trust are co-sponsoring the event, which will include hard hitting sexual health statistics, messages on safer sex and talks from people living with HIV.
The show is the brainchild of gay art entrepreneur Alastair Fairley who started the project by sending online messages to gay artists from all over the world.
He said, “I realised there are hundreds of gay artists working out there and thought it might be interesting to start grouping them together. This show is the first of those experiments, but it’s good to show art can spur other ideas too”.
The star-backed event is designed to make a splash on the coast and around the country; Fairley is already looking to take the challenging event on tour.
Al Green, Gay Men’s Community Worker for Terrence Higgins Trust in Eastbourne said:
“It’s great to have so many fantastic artists involved in Think Pink for World AIDS Day. It promises to be a brilliant event and a really good way to raise money for people living with HIV in Sussex.”
“Think Pink!” runs from Saturday December 2nd to Friday December 8th at the arts forum gallery.
