Where We No Longer Gather

Anthony Marcos Rea

Where We No Longer Gather

Medium: All-Weather Fabric and Metal

The thirteen banners that comprise Where We No Longer Gather hearken back to those long stretches of the not-so-distant historical past, when sexual minorities were subjected to broadly expressed forms of social condemnation — up to and including threats to their physical well-being. One of the guiding principles behind deciding collectively where folks might safely gather in public was the notion of hiding in plain sight. During times when homophobia has been most severe, LGBTQ folks have needed to know where to find one another, but since it wasn’t safe to socialize openly in places where they were vastly outnumbered, they claimed spaces that were both centrally located and semi-concealed. in Initially realized in 2015, Rea’s photographic series Where We No Longer Gather examines the landscapes of queer spaces in urban centers, in particular the recent history of the Liberty Memorial and its historical importance as a safe gathering space for the LGBTQ community. The artist, who was born and raised in the Westside of Kansas City, MO, worked for years in community-based organizations in Chicago focused on arts integration and youth development, and currently lives back in his old, now-gentrifying neighborhood.

Pioneer Mother Trail at Penn Valley Park
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