Art in Romney Marsh is delighted to work in partnership with Rye Library this year to highlight local LGBTQ+ heritage that has been neglected and is at risk of being lost.
In June, we celebrated LGBTQ+ Pride Month, by exhibiting portraits licensed by the National Portrait Gallery London. The photographs were of the composer Dame Ethel Smyth, writer Radclyffe Hall, and writer and gardener Vita Sackville West – each accompanied by one of their beloved dogs. With this theme in mind and knowing how much the people of Rye love their dogs, the exhibition included a quiz asking visitors to match photographs of creatives with images of their canine companions! The three creatives we researched all based themselves in Rye and surrounding villages in the period between the two world wars.
Our research has given us an insight as to why they found comfort here, and how Rye inspired and supported their work. There is a long history of LGBTQ+ people finding solace in more rural areas, where they can create interpersonal connections and build their own community – the most notable LGBTQ+ resident of Rye, Radclyffe Hall, moved to the town to escape the media scrutiny that came with the obscenity trial of her 1928 novel The Well of Loneliness. She became an active member of the community including serving as a member of the Rye Historical Society, while continuing to write. Radclyffe Hall’s contributions to the Rye community are still visible, but her work has often been pushed to the sidelines – along with many other of her contemporaries. It is our mission to make sure that their contributions to art and culture are remembered.
Our current exhibition will be on until October 31- for the duration of Black History Month – and focuses on Black LGBTQ+ members of the Harlem Renaissance whose contributions to jazz and blues music influenced culture across the Atlantic here in the UK. We have researched queer jazz singers and are showcasing them with portraits from the American University archives. The women whose portraits you can see at Rye Library are Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, and Alberta Hunter. The exhibition is visible from the windows of the library and there are of course also a list of recommended books to learn more about these women and their culture, available to borrow from the library. We are confident that their music would have been played in and around Rye and we are delighted to have been able to exhibit during the amazing Rye Jazz festival 2024.
You can find out more about Art in Romney Marsh at www.artinromneymarsh.org and on
Instagram @artromneynews.
Image Credits: CP Hunter , Picryl CC .