ABOUT NATIONAL QUEER ARTS FESTIVAL

The National Queer Arts Festival is an annual multidisciplinary Festival held May through July throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Each year we commission over twenty performances, visual arts exhibitions, and interdisciplinary showcases and in the process of producing work we support hundreds of artists, technical and production crews.

Since 1998, NQAF has presented more than 800 different events featuring over 1000 LGBTQ+ artists including Bill T. Jones, Alice Walker, Robert Rauschenberg, Meredith Monk, Adrienne Rich, Marga Gomez, Justin Chin, Thom Gunn, Cherrie Moraga and Dorothy Allison. NQAF is the largest queer arts festival in North America.

2020 FESTIVAL

White pillow with pink rose lying across it against chicken wire background and red wall

Due to Covid-19 we canceled the 2020 National Queer Arts Festival. However, we continue to support the artists and organizations who were slated to be in the festival by creating new ways to produce their work and will publish those events on this landing page. We are inspired by the passion and creativity of artists, staff, and our Bay Area arts community at large.

Here are actions you can take to support and be connected to our work.

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DONATE TO QCC

  • 90% of the funds raised through festival tickets go directly into the pockets of artists, producers, and other small arts organizations.
  • A huge part of our funding is directly tied to tourism dollars through the hotel tax, in the coming year we will need to rely more heavily on the generosity of individual supporters like you to allow us to continue our work!
DONATE

UPCOMING EVENTS

PAST NQAF 2020 EVENTS

Illustration of peacock and profile photo of brown skinned person flexing their arm

Black Faggotry

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Black Faggotry a book celebration, a community gathering a night a Black Gay Male Excellence. Join Dazié Grego-Sykes and featured performers Blackberri, Marvin K. White, Sampson McCormick and Rotimi Agbabiaka.

June 18, 2020
7pm / PST

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

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Instagram takeover
June 8 - 14

Artist conversation online
June 10, 2020
Curly haired person with one side of head shaved wearing a red shirt and overalls

Marcela Pardo Ariza

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Instagram takeover
June 15 - 21

Artist conversation online
June 18, 2020
Brown curly haired person holding their hair up in black short sleeved jumpsuit standing against backdrop of green leaves in an outdoor space

Pati Cruz

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Instagram takeover
June 22 - 28

Artist conversation online
June 25, 2020
Speckled halftone background text says Puerto Rico and the Bay Area: A Cuir / Queer Conversation

Puerto Rico & the Bay Area: A Cuir/Queer Conversation
June 30, 2020
5pm (PST)

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Aquí estamos / here we are artists and collaborators join curator, Juan Carlos Rodríguez Rivera, for a live online conversation. How do we imagine collective futures from a domestic space? What privileges does that entail? How have shelter-in-place and lockdowns affected each individual artists' practice?

aquí estamos / here we are
Virtual Exhibition
June 1- 30, 2020

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An online exhibition paired with intimate artist talks that launch every Wednesday in June and weekly Instagram takeovers by featured artists. This work is an act of collective solidarity, regeneration, and celebration between queer artists from the Bay Area and Puerto Rico redefining the domestic space.