Image: Albert Drive near Tramway, Glasgow, 1992. Courtesy of Simon Watney.
Led by writer Laura Guy and artist Steven Grainger, this session introduces a year-long project that explored recent histories of the city of Glasgow through queer and trans cultural practice. Framed by the idea of ‘inventing vocabularies’ – Ann Cvetkovich’s description of telling lesbian stories through oral history approaches – the session will focus on the methods and materials that the project explored.
Coinciding with Grainger’s ‘Power of Things Not Declared’, a poster project across the city, the event will be accompanied by a small display of ephemera that traces queer and trans interventions within Glasgow’s public realm. 'Developing Vocabularies’ will invite attendees to think through these partial documents alongside practices of storytelling, making, and organising in the present.
Laura Guy is a Reader in Gender, Sexuality and Culture at the Glasgow School of Art. She is editor of Phyllis Christopher’s artist monograph Dark Room: San Francisco Sex and Politics, 1988-2003 (Book Works, 2022) and co-editor, with Glyn Davis, of Queer Print in Europe (Bloomsbury, 2022). With Fiona Anderson, Flora Dunster and Theo Gordon, she is co-editor of a special issue of British Art Studies dedicated to ‘Queer Art in Britain since the 1980s’ (Spring, 2025). Between 2023-24, she was the project lead for ‘Remapping the ‘City of Culture’ through LGBTQ+ Cultural Production’.
Steven Grainger is a Glasgow-based artist, researcher, and lecturer in Fine Art at City of Glasgow College whose sculptural and collage based practice is engaged with ideas of visibility, invisibility and queer history. Between 2023-24, he was the research assistant for ‘Remapping the ‘City of Culture’ through LGBTQ+ Cultural Production’.
Further Info
This event is supported by a Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant and by the Glasgow School of Art as part of the research project ‘Remapping the ‘City of Culture’ through LGBTQ+ Cultural Production’.
Event Details
About Library Sessions
Centred around books, readings, discussion and the sharing of research, Library Sessions take place in TCG’s library space and include one-off sessions and events in series led by invited artists, writers, academics and researchers. Sessions might use the library as a catalyst, or contribute something new to be added to our evolving library collection.
Access
This event takes place in the library and event space on the ground floor of 5 Florence Street.
The building has step free access and a lift.
Accessible toilets are available.
The nearest subway station is Bridge Street, a 14 minute walk away.
