The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) presents Queer Interiors, a multimedia installation that explores facets of domestic life experienced by LGBTQI+ communities. It was created by Baltimore-based artists Rahne Alexander and Jaimes Mayhew working in conjunction with Chase Brexton Health Care’s LGBT Health Resource Center. The installation is on view in the Commons gallery adjacent to the Imagining Home exhibition in the BMA’s Patricia and Mark Joseph Education Center from September 18, 2016 through August 2017.
“On behalf of the BMA, I’m pleased to welcome this groundbreaking project that reflects everyday domesticity while highlighting the diversity of the Baltimore LGBTQI+ community,” said BMA Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director Christopher Bedford. “We hope that Jaimes and Rahne’s inviting installation in the Commons will help to welcome all of Baltimore’s communities to the BMA and act as a site for conversation on how our homes reflect our personal and social identities.”
“We are absolutely thrilled to see the work that is emerging from both the artists as well as the community,” said Nate Sweeney, executive director of Chase Brexton Health Care’s LGBT Health Resource Center. “We know that for so many in the LGBT community, the arts have played and will continue to play a central role in people’s health and wellbeing. Health and wellness are more than taking pills, and the healing power of expression and importance of belonging are highlighted beautifully by this installation.”
Queer Interiors is part of the BMA’s Commons Collaboration initiative, which commissions an artist and non-profit to work together on an installation and offer a series of public programs related to Imagining Home. The project conceived and produced by Alexander and Mayhew is comprised of a larger-than-life bed, shelving and other furnishings, personal artifacts, and a multimedia wall quilt known as the Baltimore LGBTQI+ Home Movie Quilt. This component of the installation pays homage to Baltimore album quilts and the AIDS Quilt, with the aim of presenting a crowd-sourced multimedia portrait of the city’s LGBTQI+ communities. During the course of the year-long installation, the décor of the bed, personal artifacts, and domestic scenes projected on the quilt will change periodically to better portray the multiple facets of the LGBTQI+ population— including many underrepresented communities. The artists will work with individuals from these communities to select personal artifacts for each change. Photographs and home video content will be crowdsourced.