Provocative, thought provoking, and beautifully done. "Queer Art", by Gemma Rolls-Bentley is a stunning coffee table book, and I am buying a copy as soon as it hits the bookstore. It's refreshing to see a compilation of art and photography representing the LGBTQI+ community.

This book was an excellent primer of queer art and exposition. I thoroughly enjoyed the images included but the accompanied writings included in the book were equally excellent. I feel as though I learned a great deal from this book and I look forward to adding a physical copy to my shelves.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for this Arc copy in exchange for my review.

A beautiful look at LGBTQIA+ art history from the 1960s to now, an indepth analysis of queer traditions and expression accompanied by a vivid selection of curated pieces from prominent artists in the community. 5/5 experience, and a recommended read.

I received an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I am leaving this review of my own accord.

I loved this. All the benefits of an art museum/gallery without the pressure of someone waiting behind you to read the blurb next to the works.

I loved the breadth of the works chosen, and the intentionality of these choices was apparent. So much life on display and so many artists that I’m left wanting to explore deeper. I need a physical copy of this one for sure.

This was beautifully researched and showcased a multitude of queer artists and their work. There are a lot of pieces it made me want to look further into. I found it admirable for attempting to depict non-print media, such as entire films or video series. I’m still deciding how I felt those landed in this text/still image based format, but I’d rather them have been included because they are art and deserve to be referenced in compilations such as this. The author described the context and intersectionality that the works existed within/stemmed from which highlighted their individuality, while also connecting them across wide-spanning generations and cultures all over the world through the section themes.

Queer Art: From Canvas to Club and the Spaces in Between by Gemma Rolls-Bentley

So this is pretty much what it looks like: it’s nonfiction, picture heavy book about queer art. I’m sure no one here is surprised. I found myself surprised at the different categories the author uses to organize the art in this book. There’s stuff you’d expect, like “self” and “intimacy” but also categories like “home” and “outside” and “survival”. And each category has numerous pieces of incredible works, each with a detailed descriptions of who the author is and what this piece means and represents, and even how it came about in some instances.

Okay so yes, I got an art minor in college, and yes, art history was one of my favorite classes. Yes, I have art history books on my coffee table. This book couldn’t be any more my kind of thing if it had my name in the title.

That being said, this is a beautiful, thoughtful, well constructed look at queer art, what it means and its role in the community. It’s incredibly informative and insightful, and a work of art unto itself.

Thanks to NetGalley and The Quarto Group for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for giving me this eARC to review.

This is a lovely book. The art is wonderful and varied with a little snippet of information next to each piece and the book is organised into categories. The book focuses on more than one medium which is nice as you can see the collection really pulls from all corners of the creative queer community. Some pieces of art are nice to look at, others are absolutely heartwrenching and some are NSFW/Minors.

This entire book is full of intimacy and community and unashamedly queer. I loved it.

This is the sort of book that if I saw out in the wild I would buy it. I'm truly grateful to NetGalley and Quarto Publishing Group – White Lion | Frances Lincoln for the preview and the opportunity to read every blurb and descriptor and preface .. now I have to wait until June to buy a copy??

Queer Art works to bring in queer art from all over the world, not just the well known and popular pieces from the West (although there are a few of those! They are important), letting us as readers/viewers experience works we would have never heard of otherwise. And it's all sorts of art, not just paintings and photography, but sculpture and stills from video, images from performance pieces, a whole wide gamut. Truly a special book that provides history and context for everything contained within.

(My only gripe, and it is very minor, is that the photograph Candy Darling on Her Deathbed was used in the preface for the 'Survival' chapter where most of the text describes the very real horror of HIV/AIDS, substance use disorder, and suicide-- this photograph would have been better suited within the chapter itself as she died of none of these things, but of lymphoma probably caused by underground unregulated hormones. Funnily enough I was just thinking about her and I turned the page and ta-dah!).

An art critic at a local newspaper once said that art should be allowed to speak for itself. What happens when the art uses a vocabulary that the viewer does not know?

This book groups the works by theme and discusses the historical and social context both of each theme and of each work. The book thus helps the viewer with the language barrier to understanding the art.

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher, the author, and to all the artists who had their work in this book for the ARC copy. These are my honest thoughts about the book.

Art is very subjective, and as such, some paintings and photos resonated a lot harder to me than others. Some pieces were beautiful, others were weird, and others were just not to my taste. It was a very diverse collection too, spanning all sorts of different ethnic and gender identities.

It would be a great coffee table book to give a friend that cares about Queer art, expression, and history.

content/trigger warnings:
artistic depictions of blood, cuts, genitals, nudity, and sex
bars (mentions of gay/lesbian/queer bars)
HIV/AIDS
homophobia
kink
lesbophobia
queerphobia
racism
transphobia

Representation
*most of the representation mentioned is about the artists themselves and not necessarily what is depicted on page*
androgyny
Arab
Argentinian
Asian
Bahamian
Bahraini
bi-gender
Black
Black Creole
Cherokee
Chicano/Chicanx
Chilean
Chinese
Choctaw
bisexual
butch
Colombian
disabled
drag
dyke
Egyptian
fa'afafine
fat/larger bodies
gay
Guatemalan
Ibibio
immigrants
Indian
Indigenous
intersex
Jamaican
Japanese
Jewish
Kashmiri
Kenyan
kink
Korean
Latine/Latinx
lesbian
Mexican
Muslim
Nigerian
nonbinary
Middle Eastern
Ohlone
Ọmọ Oòduà
Pacific Islander
polyamory
Qatari
queer
Samoan
Singaporean
South African
South Asian
Tanzania
trans femme
trans masc
trans men
trans women
Turkish
Ugandan
Ukrainian
Yoruba
Zanzibar Sultanat

A DAMN STUNNING COLLECTION!!! I adored the combination of art styles, history, cultures, and identities represented. Queer art is a blessing to us all.

While I overall truly loved this, there were a few people included in this book that I have issues with...

Gilbert & George / Pierre et Gilles. They have incredibly shitty ring wing views and have made blatantly racist comments regarding the presence of Black artists, George Floyd, and the Black Lives Matter protests. Seeing their Pierre et Giles work featured on the same page as Black queer artists, Rashaad Newsome, was... a choice. Let's not forget their past glorification of skinheads, Or Islamophobia, Or... well, I could go on for hours with their fuckery. I don't think their art should be censored, but do they really need to be included in a book with artists who existences they complain about? I don't get the point of including them in such a diverse book when they have openly stated their disdain of diversity in art, particularly when it comes to Black artists. The only thing preventing me from buying this in the future is that I refuse to buy anything that financially benefits racists. Fuck them. It was a terrible decision to include them.

Matthew Stone is an AI "artist". AI is not art, it's theft. Many of the artists included in this collection have been very outspoken about being anti-AI art. Does this really need to be explained?

I really enjoyed this beautiful collection of images of queerness. I think it’s so important to our community to have books like this that bring awareness, history and personal experiences into one place. Thank you for sharing this with me.

I can't stress enough how important it is that books like these are published, especially in the light of recent events concerning the queer communities worldwide.

I loved the structure of the book, showcasing a myriad of artistic works grouped in 3 categories of Queer spaces, Queer bodies and Queer power. After a short introduction, the book jumps right into presenting the art, providing neccessary context and background in a concise and comprehensible form at the beginning of each chapter.

Selection of the pieces is commendable. It ranges from photographs, paintings, sketches, drawings, video installations, installations, to videos, mingling older pieces with the most recent ones, however, none of them is older than 1960s and the focus is quite clearly on the 21st century.
I guess this book would be most appreciated by someone who is seeking an introduction to the queer visual art and is not overly familiar with it, because the descriptions are rather brief. This is obviously part of the book design, as it aims to offer more of a display of the art than an exhaustive analysis of it.

Overall, I loved how colourful, both visually and thematically, this book is and it brought me flashes of pure joy and empowerment. The book concludes with A Conduit of Joy, a painting with an inscription "How does it get even better" and for me, this resonates with hope and joy I wish on our whole queer community and our future.

This is a great collection of queer art and teaches an important history. Books like this need to be written in order to preserve and create a papertrail of queer history. Some of the works were recognizable, while others were new to me. Through this book, I discovered new things about familiar works and learned about other pieces of queer arts I’d never seen before.

Provocative and inspiring. I love how much activism and disruption is displayed in this selection of queer art, as well as how much intimacy and joy. Sir Isaac Julian, Hernan Bas, Sola Oluode, Ghada Khunji, Xiyadie, Laurence Philomene, Tammy Rae Carland, Hugh Steers, Kehinde Wiley, Slava Mogutin, and Charmaine Poh were all standouts for me. And the section on Act Up and AIDS protest art. (It includes Zoe Leonard’s “I Want A President” manifesto, fuck yes.)

The breadth and depth of this collection make it a powerful representation of queer lives and queer love. And as this is a digital copy, I would love to one day page through it in print.

I loved the art displayed in the book and the representation it brings to life. Wholeheartedly recommend.

Yes, yes, yes! Did I say yes already? Be still my little queer artist heart. As a disabled queer art, I struggle with finding queer art not just because galleries seldom make room for queerness but also because of accesibility. To have this access to my community in my home is everything.

This is a beautifully curated queer coffee table book.
The art was stunning and the historical bits were really interesting.
You can see the amazing work the author did with their research.
Very different and insightful.

This was absolutely beautiful. This book celebrated queer art and support for the LGBTQ plus community. With topics, such as visibility, activism, and queer love, the reader gains deeper insight into the community. The art was absolutely beautiful and each piece had a detailed description as well. I loved the way the book was set up, the art was gorgeous, and it was also educational. The historical aspects of gay culture were presented in a beautiful way.

I'll be completely honest in saying that I skimmed through and mostly looked at the pictures! There were many that I recognized and enjoyed reading about (largely the AIDS activism ones) and many others I just learned about! I do have my preferences within art and I was hoping that this book--the parts I skimmed at least--would be helpful in illuminating aspects of art history and criticism that I've yet to learn.

Queer Art definitely succeeded in that. I also appreciated the contrast between chapters and artists and mediums featured--it very much so felt like a well-rounded collection.