Seattle Pride @ Pioneer Square Art Walk

Join Seattle Pride during the Pioneer Square Art Walk at RailSpur! The Pride in Seattle: 50th Anniversary Art Exhibit was curated by pride youth interns in collaboration with Seattle Pride and Seattle’s LGBTQ+ Center. Artwork created in a youth public art activation hosted by Coyote Central and Seattle Pride will also be featured! Let's come together in the same place the first Pride organizers did in 1974 to celebrate the future of our community: our young people!

About the Exhibit
Pride in Seattle: 50th Anniversary Art Exhibit aims to highlight queer experiences through multiple lenses. This collection of art gives the LGBTQIA2S+ community a platform of self expression where their talents and creativity is recognized and celebrated. By sharing these works, our communal voices are being heard. Visual art allows viewers to emotionally engage with these narratives and gain deeper insight into the varying intersections of queer life.

As the youth interns organizing this exhibit, we focused on including underrepresented narratives, stories local to the Seattle area, and unique perspectives. It was such a joy to compile and curate so many amazing art pieces. We hope you feel represented and welcomed while exploring Pride in Seattle: 50th Anniversary Art Exhibit. Enjoy!

About the Public Art Activation
Coyote Central and Seattle Pride joined forced to create a youth public art activation! Together, we crafted a space where LGBTQIA2S+ youth can explore and create art, delving into the rich legacies of Black transwomen, Black gender diverse individuals, and Queer Indigenous or Two-Spirit people. Our focus extends to pivotal cultural elements of LGBTQIA2S+ history, including the Ballroom scene, Pioneer Square history, and responses to the AIDS epidemic.

Meet the Curators

PJ: My name is PJ and my pronouns are they/them. I am a current student at Seattle Central College getting my prerequisites to go into Nuclear Medicine Technology at Bellevue College. I have a passion for abolitionist organizing and practice. My high school years were spent growing up and flourishing in Tacoma, which I will forever consider my home. But I am starting to love life here in Seattle as well. In my free time, I love to write letters and send postcards, play Stardew Valley on my switch, watch science documentaries and cook Filipino food. My life has always been a balance of combining art, organizing and queerness with the beauty of science and education. I had the pleasure of designing this program and all of the art exhibit graphics.

Edelawit: My name is Edelawit and I use they/them pronouns. I am a junior at Nova High School as well as a Running Start student at Seattle Central College. My dream career is being a museum curator and being able to create/represent/advocate for social change through creative spaces like museums. I’m also a lifelong dancer with experience in all styles but mainly West African and Ballet. As a Black, non binary, queer person I’m very fulfilled by collaborating with queer folks to create spaces for and by queer folk.

Lin: Hi, my name is Lin and I use they/them pronouns. I’m a junior at Nova High School, who is pursuing running start at Seattle Central College. I love making art and spending time outside by going on hikes, exploring new places, and learning about plants & ecological systems. Discovering the world of queer art and artists helped me connect with the community and discover my own art style. I believe it’s important for underrepresented voices to be uplifted and for their art to be shared. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to be a curator of this exhibit and to be working with Seattle Pride for the event's 50th anniversary. I hope you enjoy the exhibit.

Staff

Jing Jing Wang

My name is Jing Jing Wang (they/TA/他/elle/él) and I like to describe myself as a sappy queer alien who loves a lot of things very deeply! I studied Sociology and Gender and Feminist Studies at Pitzer College and have been professionally gay at Seattle’s LGBTQ+ Center for the past year. In my role as Youth Advocacy Program Co-Manager, I had the honor of collaborating with some of our Pride Interns on the 50th Anniversary Art Exhibit! I am a multidisciplinary artist and intersectional feminist who loves creating and enjoying art of all kinds, forming intergenerational connections, and collaborative storytelling. I move through life with a decolonial, queer theory, and disability justice informed lens. My work can be found in The Stranger’s 2018 Queer Issue, Sex Positive Now: An Anthology of Movers and Shakers in the World of Sexuality, It’s Real Magazine, a crosswalk in Redmond’s Downtown Park (my hometown!), and the thirty plus sketchbooks stuffed in my bookshelf.The most fulfilling part of my job is working with youth to create community and uplift our stories. I hope you enjoy this exhibit, which has been so intentionally curated by our youth!

Instagram: @jingshiwang01 (Content note: artistic nudity)

Daynon Jackson

My name is Daynon Jackson (They/Them/Theirs). I am a Queer Black and Filipino advocate born and raised in the Greater Seattle Area. I am driven to produce systemic change using youth empowerment and joy as radical resistance. I am experienced in mentorship, storytelling, and organizing QTBIPOC Youth toward the long-term goals of developing policy changes, sustainable community spaces, and self-determination/self-accountability. I understand that the advocacy work I do is ancestral work. I make an effort to slow down, work with others, and build and maintain healing spaces. Our work together will continue beyond my elders, beyond me, and into younger hands and I would like to give them all many places to rest and play. I love a good story be it a video game, book, movie, or conversation with others. I have a deep love for water. I spend my time in baths, swimming in lakes, and paddleboarding.