Queer|Art Awards The 2023 Robert Giard Grant for Emerging LGBTQ+ Photographers

B Dukes headshot

B DUKES HONORED AS WINNER; FOUR FINALISTS RECOGNIZED

Queer|Art, New York City’s home for the creative and professional development of LGBTQ+ artists, is pleased to announce the 2023 winner of The Robert Giard Grant for Emerging LGBTQ+ Photographers: multidisciplinary artist and healer B Dukes. The Oakland-based artist will receive $10,000, and four distinguished finalists will also receive awards. 2023 Finalists Kenzi Crash, Elijah Ndoumbe, Zula Rabikowska, and Chad Unger will each receive a grant of $1,250. 

The Robert Giard Grant for Emerging LGBTQ+ Photographers supports and promotes self-taught, early career or otherwise emerging LGBTQ+ artists, awarded on a yearly basis. This support is vital for emerging artists, who may lack the financial resources or institutional support available to more established artists. The grant was organized in partnership with The Robert Giard Foundation from 2020 until 2022 when the Foundation ceased operations. Queer|Art gratefully acknowledges the Robert Giard Foundation’s generous support in fully funding the 2023 Giard Grant cycle.

This year’s awarded projects foreground collective healing, intimacy and pleasure within queer communities, and the politics of visibility. The Southern-raised, Oakland-based artist B Dukes will receive a $10,000 cash grant to support the development of their series Scarred and Liberated. For this forthcoming body of work, the artist will travel to their hometown in the backwoods of South Carolina to take self portraits that document their self-harm scars. Many of these portraits will be staged on the land in which Dukes was raised—the photos capture the terrain that surrounds the home that their great grandmother built and passed down to generations to come. For Dukes, the ritual of returning home is crucial to their healing journey: it’s an embodied practice of reclamation which uplifts the sites in which they have felt “both at home and alone.” Scarred and Liberated will also include an assortment of collages that depict the artist’s top surgery and their recovery as they were cared for by their parents and siblings. Through the lens, Dukes sets out to document their personal survival and perseverance: across their deeply emotive practice, the camera is an instrument of catharsis, which reimagines the wounds of harrowing memories. 

“B Dukes takes photography to another level, one of return and also release, to find stories from scars, to bring spiritual connection to and from ancestors, and step into a place of trans and non-binary gender euphoria centering Black and Brown queer life. I’m excited for B Duke’s work to come and those of us who will be transformed by it,” writes 2023 Robert Giard Grant Judge, Ariel Goldberg.

2023 Giard Grant Judge Lola Flash adds, “I love B’s work. Although it is rooted in trauma, both personally and historically, there’s an eternal hope and pushback against society in the work. In their own words B says, ‘reclaiming peace and bodily autonomy is a healing vow,’ not only for themself but for our LGBTQ+ communities, as well.”

Upon receiving the award, Dukes writes:“Receiving this award and recognition expands the bounds of what is possible with this project as well as future visions that have been brewing in my heart space. As an artist originally from the backwoods of the Deep South, this grant shines a light on the experience of Black, trans and non-binary people from small town South Carolina and the ways that the landscapes inspire the paths forward.” 

193 applications were received for this award cycle. The 2023 judges included Lola Flash, Ariel Goldberg, Leandro Justen, Benjy Russell, and Logan MacDonald. 

About B Dukes, Winner
Inspired by the voices of the ancestors and plant medicines—big ma’s baby—Back Woods, Deep South raised, B Dukes (they/them) is a multidisciplinary non-binary artist, healer, medicine maker, spirit B who approaches their writing, sonic creations, dj mixes, visual art, filmmaking and ceremonies with the transformational healing of their Black & Brown queer kin in mind. Embracing the sacred art of playing with nature, inquiry, pleasure and rest, B Dukes is currently exploring birthing sacred spaces, interactive art, films and visual art that liberates, heals and grounds. B is also the creator and lead facilitator of the When We Are Free artist residency, a space where Black and Brown, queer, trans creatives are given the space and time to connect with themselves, their practices and each other.

On the subject of their winning project, Dukes reflects, “weaving the worlds of healing, transformation, spiritual connection, trans identity, Scarred and Liberated is a journey of gender euphoria and reconnecting with ancestral spirits while also reflecting on the once tainted perspective of self—falling in love with the renewed body.

About Kenzi Crash, Finalist
An east coaster through and through, Kenzi Crash is a documentarian of their own world and a fantasizer of alternative realities. She is a queer archivist, a sex and kink positive artist, a smut peddler, and a hopeful visionary of the future.  Wielding a camera for the past two decades she has contributed to the realization of countless other people’s fantasies, successfully experimented with moving images, and memorialized hundreds of members of her community. Eroticism and the unique beauty of queerness continue to be the heartbeat that pumps blood into the veins of her work, and in her new series they take center stage.

About Elijah Ndoumbe, Finalist
Elijah Ndoumbe is a multidisciplinary artist, storyteller, dream-weaver, and collaborator. They engage lens-based work as a practice of care that is capable of producing a radical-care-politic in community, in collaboration, in collective production and intentionality. Feelings of breath, body, space, desire, music and movement are key elements to their process of image-making. Their work has screened at the Sundance Film Festival (2022) and won awards at NewFest (2021) and the Durban International Film Festival (2022). Ndoumbe was a 2021 artist in residence at Black Rock Senegal, and exhibited photographs paired with sonic soundscapes at the 2022 DAK’ART Biennale as part of Kehinde Wiley’s Black Rock 40 exhibit. They exhibited at the Rencontres de Bamako African Photography Biennale (2022-2023), participated in CPH:LAB via CPH:DOX (2022-2023), and exhibited in a group show as a winner of queer art prize Utopi·e at the Magasin Generaux in Paris, France (2023). They are a recipient of the 2023 Bourse ADIAF Émergence, and are currently in development on a project with artists between France, Senegal, and the US.

About Zula Rabikowska, Finalist
Zula Rabikowska writes, “I am a Polish queer photographer and visual artist currently based in London. I was born in Poland, grew up in the UK and my experience of migration influences my practice. My projects explore migration, gender and LGBTQI+ communities with a focus on Central and Eastern Europe. My work unpicks the binary understanding associated with the “West” and the “East”. I work with multimedia, film, and photography, and incorporate archival images and documents to challenge conventional visual story-telling norms. I am interested in the collapse of the Soviet Regime and the dismantling of European colonial structure, and my last documentary project explores gender identity in Central and Eastern Europe, which I carried out by travelling for 5,000 miles along the former “Iron Curtain”. I hold a MRes in French Postcolonial Literature from the University of Warwick and an MA in Documentary Photography from the University of the Arts London. I exhibited as a solo artist in London (England) and Belfast (Northern Ireland), and my group shows include Format Festival (UK), Brighton Photo Fringe (UK), Lahti Fringe Festival (Finland), Gothenburg Fringe Festival (Sweden) Urban Banks Berlin (Germany) and Enjoy Museum of Art Beijing (China). My work has been published internationally including Dazed and Confused, British Journal of Photography, the BCC, The Times. Guardian, The Calvert Journal (amongst others) I work as a photographer in Europe, and a photography lecturer in Kingston University London, and I am also a co-founder of the Red Zenith Collective, an online platform for non-binary and female artists from Central and Eastern Europe.”

About Chad Unger, Finalist
Chad Unger (b. 1993) is a Deaf-Queer visual artist originally from Maryland, currently based in Los Angeles. Growing up with a deaf family, actively involved with the deaf community, and primarily communicating through American Sign Language, Chad’s experiences shaped him into an observer with deep appreciation of stories with strong visual elements. Chad started his career by merging his passion of capturing stories and snowboarding in Utah. There, the landscape guided Chad’s creative aesthetic to capture the subject’s context and deepen the narrative. Being a traveler who lived in several states in the US, Chad met numerous people who empowered him to also live his authentic self. After coming out in 2018, Chad sought out Deaf Queer stories. His journey led him to meet several Deaf Queer elders who lived through the AIDS crisis and was shocked how little of it has been documented. With profound appreciation for the dwindling group of survivors, Chad was inspired to preserve their stories before they are lost. He has been interviewing deaf queers, asking about how their disability background informed their experiences of being queer in America. His goal is to inspire both deaf and queer communities to not only appreciate these elders, but also the communities that they forged to sustain hope for future generations. This project will culminate in a photo book and short film.

About the 2023 Judges
Lola Flash challenges stereotypes and gender, sexual, and racial preconceptions across their work. As a photographer, Flash has worked at the forefront of genderqueer visual politics for more than four decades. An active member of ACT UP during the time of the AIDS epidemic in New York City, Flash was notably featured in the 1989 “Kissing Doesn’t Kill” poster. Their art and activism are profoundly connected, fueling a life-long commitment to visibility and preserving the legacy of LGBTQIA+ and communities of color worldwide. Flash has work included in important collections such as the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, MoMA, the Whitney, the Museum of the African American of History and Culture and the Brooklyn Museum. They are currently a proud member of the Kamoinge Collective, and on the Board of Queer Art. Flash received their bachelor’s degree from Maryland Institute and Masters’ from London College of Printing, in the UK. Flash works primarily in portraiture, engaging those who are often deemed invisible. Flash’s practice is firmly rooted in social justice advocacy around sexual, racial, and cultural differences.

Ariel Goldberg is a writer, curator, and photographer based in New York City. Goldberg’s books include The Estrangement Principle (Nightboat Books, 2016) and The Photographer (Roof Books, 2015), and their short-form writing has most recently appeared in Lucid Knowledge: On the Currency of the Photographic Image, Afterimage Journal, e-flux, Jewish Currents, Artforum, and Art in America. Their exhibition on photography’s relationship to spaces for learning, Images on which to build, 1970s-1990s is on view at the Contemporary Art Center in Cincinnati as part of the 2022 FotoFocus Biennial and travels to Leslie Lohman Museum of Art in March 2023. Goldberg has curated public programs for over ten years at venues including The Poetry Project and Tucson Jewish Museum & Holocaust Center. With Noam Parness they co-curated “Uncanny Effects: Robert Giard’s Currents of Connection” (2020) at Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art. Their work has been supported by the New Jewish Culture Fellowship, New York Public Library Research Rooms, the Franklin Furnace Fund, and SOMA in Mexico City. They were a 2020 recipient of the Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant for their book-in-progress on trans and queer image cultures of the late 20th century. Goldberg has taught photography, writing, and contemporary art practices at Bard College, The New School, Pratt Institute, and Rutgers University.

Leandro Justen is a Brazilian-born queer photographer and documentarian. Leandro uses photography as a way to connect with and document the queer community in New York City, and as a tool for self-discovery and liberation. From 2019 through 2021, Leandro helped organize the Queer Liberation March, a grassroots-led march created to honor the history of protest and activism of the Stonewall Rebellion of 1969. In 2021, he presented his first solo show “Into The Streets: Photographs of LGBTQ+ Activism. New York City, 2018-2021.” The exhibition highlighted key historic LGBTQ+ events and the work of BIPOC activists and community organizers.

Logan MacDonald is an artist, curator, writer, educator and activist who focuses on queer, disability and Indigenous perspectives. He is of mixed-European and Mi’kmaw ancestry, who identifies with both his Indigenous and settler roots. Born in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, his Mi’kmaw ancestry is connected to Elmastukwek, Ktaqamkuk. His artwork has been exhibited across North America, notably with exhibitions at L.A.C.E. (Los Angeles) John Connelly Presents (New York), Dunlop Gallery (Regina), BACA (Montréal) and at the 2021 Bonavista Biennale.  In 2019, MacDonald was longlisted for the Sobey Art Award  and was honoured with a six-month residency at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin. He is a graduate from Concordia University with a BFA in Interdisciplinary Studies, and a MFA in Studio Arts from York University. MacDonald is an Assistant Professor in Studio Arts and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Art at  University of Waterloo whereby his focus is on the creation of an Indigenous artist-residency program called The Longhouse Labs.

Benjy Russell is a Choctaw artist who grew up in rural Oklahoma, and for the last fourteen years has lived in rural Tennessee on stolen Euchee land. Living as a gay man in these rural landscapes can often feel impossible, yet here Russell has found a thriving and diverse community of queer and trans people to vision the new world along with him. As an artist, Russell is compelled by the conversation that happens at the intersection of philosophy, science, and art— a way to see the world prismatically and to unlearn harmful, antiquated social structures. He has always looked to science fiction as a model for how we can shape the future we want. By creating a fictionalized version of the future we desire, we take the first step towards its existence. Most of Russell’s work utilizes in-camera effects, using sculpture, studio lights, wires, and mirrors in lieu of photoshop to allude to magical realism. By creating a physical moment of impossibility, you can hold it up to the rest of the world to show what else is possible. His work points to some of the joy inherent in this life, showing it to be as much of the present moment as it is of the future.

About The Robert Giard Foundation
The Robert Giard Foundation (RGF) was a nonprofit charitable organization launched in 2002, following the death of the pioneering American photographer Robert Giard, to honor his legacy and focus on the future of LGBTQ+ photography. RGF promoted the use of Giard’s work for educational purposes and supported public programs focusing on queer photography and cultural/political movements, up until 2022 when the Foundation closed its doors.

RGF additionally provided annual support to self-taught, early career, or otherwise emerging photographers who illuminate aspects of gender and sexuality in their work. Recipients of RGF grants empower and amplify queer voices while helping to build a strong and self-reflective community. Established at the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies, City University of New York in 2008, and relocated to Queer|Art in 2019, the Giard Grant program has awarded over $125,000 in competitive prize money to 19 projects in the U.S. and around the world. For inquiries about RGF, contact: jsilin@optonline.net.

About Robert Giard
Robert Giard (1939-2002) was a portrait, landscape, and figure photographer who came to the practice of photography relatively late in life. In 1972, he began to take photographs, concentrating on landscapes of the South Fork of Long Island, portraits of friends, many of them artists and writers in the region, and the nude figure. He is best known for photographing over 500 LGBTQ+ writers and activists. A selection from his project, Particular Voices: Portraits of Gay and Lesbian Writers, was published in 1997 by MIT Press and led to a groundbreaking exhibit at the New York Public Library the following year.

In 1985, after seeing a performance of Larry Kramer’s The Normal Heart, as the AIDS crisis raged, Giard decided to turn his camera towards the LGBTQ+ literary community to preserve a record of queer lives and histories. He began documenting LGBTQ+ literary figures, both established and emerging, in a series of unadorned, yet sometimes witty and playful portraits that would eventually number over 500 by the time of his death. 

Giard’s work can be found in the collections of The National Portrait Gallery, The Library of Congress, The Brooklyn Museum, the Art Museum at the University of Toronto, the San Francisco Public Library, the New York Public Library, the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study; his complete archive, including work books and ephemera, can be found at Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. For inquiries about Robert Giard’s work, contact: jsilin@optonline.net.

About Queer|Art
Queer|Art connects and empowers LGBTQ+ artists across generations and creative disciplines. Founded in 2009, we are an artist-led and community-centered organization—united by shared values of collective care, creative resilience, and the preservation and advancement of queer legacies and queer futures. 

The devastating loss of a generation of artists to the ongoing AIDS pandemic has created a profound longing for cross-generational connections, mentorship, and community. Queer|Art serves as a ballast against this loss, seeking to highlight and address a continuing fundamental lack of both economic and institutional support for our community. 

Ongoing programmatic initiatives include: our annual cornerstone program, the year-long Queer|Art|Mentorship and a wide array of awards, grants, and offerings that provide direct support to LGBTQ+ artists.

Website: www.queer-art.org
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