Photo FeaturesCheck Out Photos of These 12 Theatremakers Celebrating Queer Joy With Ring of KeysThe arts organization partnered with Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS for a Pride photo shoot with photographer Shani Hadjian.
By
Marc J. Franklin
June 01, 2021
Tẹmídayọ Amay, Andrea Prestinario, and Kevin Paley
June 1 marks the beginning of Pride month, a month honoring queer history and the LGBTQIA+ community. To commemorate the month, arts service organization Ring of Keys partnered with photographer Shani Hadijan to create a celebratory photo shoot capturing 12 theatremakers showcasing queeer joy in collaboration with Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.
“Our community has experienced so much trauma in the past year, particularly the trans community, as they face discrimination from over 100 anti-trans bills in state legislatures,” Ring of Keys Executive Director and Co-Founder Andrea Prestinario explained. ”We’ve also witnessed increasing violence toward our BIPOC and AAPI communities. This Pride, we want to celebrate our community and remember what brings us joy, what brings us hope. This queer joy campaign is an opportunity to share our queer selves, in our truth and authenticity, while creating visibility, which is at the core of our Ring of Keys mission.”
“After being physically separated from the community for the past year of uncertainty and strife, I really wanted this queer joy photo shoot to feel like a celebration, to uplift ourselves,” Hadjian stated. “I also knew I wanted to tie in a rainbow: different colors, unique and whole in themselves, but when put together create their own beautiful spectrum, much like the queer community. I decided to go with an additive color mixing concept which, in theory, is a reverse rainbow. In practice, it produces a slight multicolor effect in the subject's shadows or, the way I see it, creates their rainbow silhouettes.”
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Check Out Photos of These 12 Theatremakers Celebrating Queer Joy With Ring of Keys
Check Out Photos of These 12 Theatremakers Celebrating Queer Joy With Ring of Keys
12 PHOTOS
“Queer joy to me is embracing that there isn't one way to look non-binary/genderqueer. There's infinite ways.” –Actor/Writer Sophie Sagan-Gutherz (They/Them)
“Queer joy is singing, dancing, laughing, wearing what you want, and kissing who you want.” –Music Director/Composer/Arranger/Pianist Dionne McClain-Freeney (She/Her)
Shani Hadjian
“Queer joy to me is queer community coming together and uplifting each other. I built Ring of Keys because there was no existing network of this specific community, and watching Keys meet, befriend, and hire each other because of this organization is a personal queer joy explosion.” –Actor/Singer/Producer and Ring of Keys Executive Director Andrea Prestinario (She/Her)
“Queer joy to me is a work in progress. It is resilience, finding the places and people where I feel seen, loved, and celebrated, and learning to free myself from the stigmas surrounding my AAPI bisexuality.” –Actor/Singer/Fiber Artist Kristian Espiritu (She/They/Siya)
“To quote the poet Toi Dericotte, ‘Joy is an act of resistance.’ Queer joy to me is exactly this—living loudly and authentically as our true selves, standing defiantly in the face of people and systems that seek to diminish our existence. Queer joy is celebrating our unique identities—found at the intersections of race, gender(s), class, age, size and ability—while working together for collective liberation.” –Actor/Singer-Songwriter Madge Dietrich (She/Her)
“Queer joy is the freedom to be.” –Actor/Director Kevin Paley (They/Them)
“To me, queer joy is self acceptance; it's living in the gratitude of how far we've come, alongside the ever-expanding liberation and empowerment of our future.” –Actor/Singer Ashley Blanchet (She/Her)
“Queer joy to me is being able to exist authentically and feeling a calm content, whether you’re surrounded by your community, your allies, or yourself.” –Composer/Lyricist/Musician Will Shishmanian (He/Him)
“Queer joy is my inner child!” –Playwright/Actor/Model Morgan Dean (They/Them)
“To me, queer joy is queer people of all ages seeing our own stories in art and popular culture (and not only sad stories). It comes from recognizing ourselves in not just the characters, but the actors, writers, directors, designers, and producers. It comes from seeing that our stories are worth telling and celebrating, and that we can be the ones to tell them!” –Actor/Composer-Lyricist/Musician Pearl Rhein (She/Her)
“My queer joy is a pleasure I share with myself and those who lift me up. Queer joy means liberation and love. It means receiving abundant support for me, my art, PILOT, and all that I am and become. My name, Tẹmídayọ Amay, actually means my joy has come! I exist for my pleasure, and that is my joy.” –Writer/Actor/Producer/Director Tẹmídayọ Amay (They/Them)
“Queer joy means community, connection, and authenticity; being the real me ALL the time; kissing my girlfriend in public and feeling badass about it!” –Dancer/Choreographer Adriana Pierce (She/Her)
Ring of Keys is a nonprofit organization that fosters community and visibility for musical theatre artists—onstage and off—who self-identify as queer women, transgender, and gender non-conforming artists. “Since you have to ‘see it to be it,’ as Jeanine Tesori said famously, I hope that this representation gives more queer artists the confidence and motivation to share their truth with the world,” Prestinario said.
