A national awards program, QUEER|ART|PRIZE honors the work of LGBTQ+ artists in areas of Sustained Achievement and Recent Work, with a ceremony that celebrates the entire Queer|Art community.

Queer|Art|Prize presents two $10,000 awards to LGBTQ+ artists based in the United States: one for Sustained Achievement and the other for Recent Work. The award is possible through Queer|Art’s ongoing partnership with HBO and was developed in collaboration with the Queer|Art artist community. Featuring a Nominating Committee of 20 esteemed arts professionals from around the country, Queer|Art|Prize confirms the impact of Queer|Art’s programming and support on a national level and immediately establishes itself as one of the most significant awards specifically created to recognize the artistry and contributions of LGBTQ+ artists.

THE ANNUAL PARTY

November 1, 2019, 7-10pm

The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center
208 W 13 Street, New York, NY 11206

The 2019 Queer|Art|Prize honored Sustained Achievement winner, Joan Jett Blakk, and the announcement of the Recent Work winners jumatatu m. poe & Jermone Donte Beacham took place at The Annual Party on Friday, November 1. Our hosts, theater artists Mashuq Mushtaq Deen and Xandra Clark, have worked closely together throughout the past year as Mentor and Fellow. The evening included an opening reception for the 2018-2019 Queer|Art|Mentorship Annual exhibition entitled “How do we know what we need you to know: Intimate access and collective care” curated by current Fellow Jeanne Vaccaro (on view Nov 1, 2019-Jan 9, 2020). And the night will concluded with a dance party with DJ Sandy, bringing the epic night of queer revelry and celebration to a close.

2019 QUEER|ART|PRIZE SUSTAINED ACHIEVEMENT WINNER & RECENT WORK FINALISTS

2019 SUSTAINED ACHIEVEMENT WINNER

Joan Jett Blakk, aka Terence Alan Smith, a Detroit native, called Chicago home from the late ‘70s to the early ‘90s when he worked as a fitness instructor, actor, political activist and drag performer at such clubs as Berlin and Lower Links. Smith was one of the founders of the Chicago chapter of Queer Nation, a political action group focused on queer issues at the height of the AIDS crisis. In 1990, Queer Nation asked Smith to run for Mayor, as his drag persona Joan Jett Blakk, against Richard Daley. The goal of Joan Jett Blakk's campaign was never to win the election but to garner as much media attention as possible for Chicago's queer community and the AIDS epidemic. In 1992, on the Queer Nation Party ticket, Joan Jett Blakk ran for President of the United States. Shortly after, Smith moved to San Francisco and joined the performance group Pomo Afro Homos, launched his talk show, Late Nite with Joan Jett Blakk, and continued to run for office. He still resides in San Francisco today.

2019 RECENT WORK WINNER

JUMATATU M. POE & JERMONE DONTE BEACHAM

This spirited work is about the multiplicity of Black, queer spaces. In this performance, queer space is a doing; wherever your body is, no matter what, we are queer in the space. In tandem with the mobilizing impact that Joan Jett Blakk is being recognized for, this work sets precedent on the social responsibility that artists continue to hold.   

For gathering people in the spaces that exist within the margins, for responding in joy through slippage, and engaging the possibilites of Black and queer community resiliency, Queer|Art and the 2019 Queer|Art|Prize Nominating Committee and Judges award “Let ‘im Move You: This is a formation” by jumatatu m. poe & Jermone Donte Beacham the 2019 Queer|Art|Prize for Recent Work.

“Congratulations to jumatatu poe & Donte Beacham and all of us who are part of Let ‘im Move You: This is a formation. My name is Maria Bauman-Morales, and I am part of the cast of Let ‘im Move You: This is a formation.

So juma & Donte are getting people in formation in Cincinnati, Ohio where part of the project is happening and they asked me to accept this award SHOULD it be granted to them on their behalf and I’m happy to. And really what we want to share is that everyone who was nominated is fierce and amazing and thank god that we’re all out here making art – these four finalists and all of us.

Big shout out and honor to the whole J-Sette community.
J-Sette dance technique is the foundation of the whole Let ‘im Move You series that juma & Donte have been working on for over a decade. And particularly, we shout out the Black, queer femmes who have been working and working and working and sweating and innovating on the form. So on behalf on juma & Donte, we are so beautifully queer and we really do take it seriously and honor the sisters on whose shoulders we are dancing and the people that we’re dancing with. And shout out to being not only queer, and not only Black, but Black and queer all at the same time.”

- Maria Bauman-Morales, accepting the award on behalf of jumatatu m. poe & Donte Beacham.

jumatatu m. poe is a choreographer and performer based between Philadelphia and New York City who grew up dancing around the living room and at parties with siblings and cousins. poe strives to engage in and further dialogues with Black queer folks, create lovingly agitating performance work that recognizes history as only one option for the contextualization of the present, and continue to imagine options for artists’ economic and emotional sustainability. poe has performed in various cities around the U.S. and in Europe, and has received various awards including: a 2010-2011 Live Arts Brewery Fellowship (Philadelphia), 2010-2012 and 2017 annual Pew Center for Arts & Heritage Performance Grants, a 2011-2013 Community Education Center Residency Fellowship (Philadelphia), a 2012 Pew Center for Arts & Heritage Fellowship (Philadelphia), a 2016 18th Street Arts Center creative residency (Santa Monica), a 2017 Sacatar Residency Fellowship (Bahia, Brazil), a 2017 MAP Fund award with Jermone Donte Beacham, a 2017 NEFA National Dance Project Production Grant with Jermone Donte Beacham, a 2018 MANCC residency, three Swarthmore College Cooper Foundation grants for presenting other artists (Swarthmore, PA).

Jermone Donte Beacham began dancing hip hop in high school, and was later introduced to the world of J-Sette by women. J-Sette historically refers to Jackson State University’s female drill team that began in the 1970s. Beacham “created” the dance style, and thus far have made it a distinctive form of dance. Beacham was interested in this type of dance, but not entirely until seeing a group of males performing it. Currently, Beacham has established a J-Sette line, Mystic Force. Previously, Beacham served as co-captain of Dallas’ Texas Teasers and performed in several events and competitions, including 2 SetteItOff video challenges, Atlanta Pride 2010, Tennessee Classics 2009, and Memphis Pride 2008.

2019 RECENT WORK FINALISTS

The Finalists for the Recent Work award, honoring specific projects, include B. Anele for @surprisinghealthbenefits (ongoing), an Instagram account documenting organic experiences that navigate material reality in conjunction with cyber reality as a queer and Black contemporary artist; jumatatu m. poe & Jermone Donte Beacham for Let ‘im Move You: This is a formation (2019), a performance series using J-Sette movement with the role of strategy in dance making and social design to tour to sidewalks within historically Black neighborhoods, institutional art spaces, and queer nightclub spaces; Ja’Tovia Gary for The Giverny Document (Single Channel) (2019), a multi-textured cinematic poem that meditates on the safety and bodily autonomy of Black women filmed on location in Harlem, USA and in Claude Monet’s historic gardens in Giverny, France; and Sarah Hennies for Contralto (2019), a cinematic film and live musical performance that features a cast of trans women speaking, singing, and performing vocal exercises.

2019 ADJUDICATION PANEL

2019 NOMINATING COMMITTEE

Nominations for each award were made by a diverse committee of 18 esteemed arts professionals from around the country, including archivists, art historians, critics, curators, choreographers, cultural organizers, visual artists, performing artists, teaching artists, scholars, writers, directors, and filmmakers with various intersecting commitments to queer culture.

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