June has already brought pride hikes, talks and rainbow flags to New York. You might be planning your outfit for the NYC Pride Parade on June 28 — the anniversary of the Stonewall uprising that propelled the LGBTQ+ rights movement into a new era. Or reveling in memories from Sunday’s Queens Pride Parade, an event founded by local activists after the 1990 murder of Julio Rivera, a gay Puerto Rican bartender in Jackson Heights.
Pride events can also be found in bookstores, libraries, arts spaces and LGBTQ-friendly hubs. Here are a few ways to support them this month and beyond:
Queens World Film Festival
Katha Cato is best known as the force behind the Queens World Film Festival, the borough’s annual showcase of diverse voices in independent filmmaking. For Pride Month, she’s elevating another form of storytelling: Prideful Poetry, a new event that will take place at Flushing Town Hall on Friday, June 12. Hosted by the drag queen Avant Garbage, the event invites poets and neighbors to gather and celebrate visibility, expression and belonging. Doors open at 6:30 p.m., performances start at 7 p.m. and refreshments will be served at 8:15 p.m. Tickets are $5 plus a small convenience fee. Snag tickets.
Art Retail Therapy
It began as an art supply store in 2021 and has since become a neighborhood institution. Founded by Francisco Segarra and Charlie Márquez, queer-owned Art Retail Therapy (A.R.T.) in Jackson Heights has something for everyone: customers seeking high-quality art supplies, students there for the weekly figure drawing classes, immigrant neighbors who come for photocopies and help with documents and artists who need a space to showcase their work.
“It was a love project — it started off as this cool thing to run an art store,” Segarra said in an Epicenter NYC profile. “And now I get [people saying] ‘Everything I need is here.’”
On Saturday, June 13, from 3 to 6 p.m., A.R.T. will host an opening celebration for “HOP ON!,” a group exhibition dedicated to New York City trains and transit culture. The show will feature running model trains and official vintage MTA and NYC memorabilia for browsing and for sale. A.R.T. is located at 84-26 37th Ave. Learn more.
Yu & Me Books
In 2021, Lucy Yu left a career in chemical engineering to open Yu & Me Books in Manhattan’s Chinatown. She envisioned a space that would uplift authors of color and where Asian Americans and other diasporic communities could see themselves reflected on the shelves. When a fire devastated the popular store, Yu was forced to start over, while navigating burnout and mental health needs.
The queer Asian American-owned bookshop strives to balance empowerment and self-care. The store is hosting a pop-up with a genderless jewelry project that explores identity, fluidity and life between cultures. Learn more about Lizhen Jewelry.
Through a tarot reading fundraiser on Friday, June 12, it’s also showing another kind of pride: the solidarity between Black/African, SWANA (Southwest Asian/North African), Afro-Diaspora, Asian, Asian Diaspora and Blasian (Black and Asian) communities. Learn more.
Fringe Records
Ridgewood-based Fringe Records is a queer-owned “noise hub” for North Brooklyn and Queens neighbors — and for like-minded musicians from the West Coast and as far away as Japan. A go-to for those seeking underground music collections, it also regularly hosts Fruit Basket Comedy, a queer comedy night.
The record shop carries genres like industrial noise music, dark ambient music, goth and extreme metal subgenres like black or doom metal along with Italo disco, house music, queer dance music and old-school boogie disco. It also hosts art maker spaces and live music events such as this noise music show coming up on Saturday, June 13 at 7:30 p.m.
Stop by at 656 Woodward Ave. in Queens and check online for more upcoming events.
Working Girls Press
Founded by Emily Marie Passos Duffy and Molly B. Simmons, this independent publishing collective run for and by sex workers has roots in NYC. Among its anthologies, poetry collections and art books, you can find Working Girls Press’s recently launched collection of sex workers’ stories about labor, burnout and survival in the field: “I Hate My Job.” Order it or other works or merch from their collection.
The press pays its contributors upfront, shares royalties and treats publishing as a form of community-building. Supporting its books is one way to elevate voices often excluded from traditional literary spaces. “It’s an access point to community,” Simmons told Epicenter NYC.
Layra Marz Photography
Brooklyn photographer Layra Marte has built her business, Layra Marz Photography, around a simple invitation: come as you are. Through intimate portrait and boudoir sessions, Marte helps clients celebrate themselves without pressure to transform or perform. Her work, particularly with women, queer clients and people of color, centers authenticity, self-expression and a lens of self-acceptance.
Marte’s previous projects include a collaboration on a global anti-bullying campaign in which subjects posed with words written on their backs – words representing things that no longer served them, making a symbolic shedding through portraiture. Book a boudoir photography session with Marte.
A taste of city library pride
Libraries, the ultimate “third spaces,” and their workers offer inclusive spaces and programming. This Pride month, their free offerings for queer folks and allies include interactive drag prep, queer-centered films and more. Here’s a small sampling:
QUEENS PUBLIC LIBRARY
On Thursday, June 11, the Long Island City branch hosts “The Art of Drag Make-Up Demo & Conversation,” in which participants can learn makeup techniques and hear from drag artists about self-expression and identity.
Earlier that day, Elmhurst Library will host its second annual Pride Resource Fair. The event brings together LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, health organizations and community partners alongside a special vogue performance.
BROOKLYN PUBLIC LIBRARY
On Wednesday, June 24, Brooklyn Public Library’s Walt Whitman branch will help kick off Queerly Beloved: Pride Shorts in the Park in Fort Greene.
Before the outdoor film screenings begin, visitors can browse LGBTQ+ books, films and recommendations from library staff and local booksellers. Then comes an evening of short films showcasing LGBTQ stories from around the world.
NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
NYPL is inviting you to several paint and pride events: Visitors can create rainbow-themed paintings at Harlem Library on Wednesday, June 17 from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., and at Columbus Library on Tuesday, June 23 from 5 to 6:30 p.m. Meanwhile, Macomb’s Bridge Library is offering a Pride-themed rock painting workshop on June 17 from 11 a.m. to 12:45 p.m.
