In the workshop, Karol Radziszewski, the major Polish contemporary queer artist, responded to conservative "anti-gender" backlash by focusing on minority (LGBTQ+) voices to rewrite such narratives. The workshop explored histories of gender-non normativity and queer activism in globally peripheral countries (CEE and LA, particularly Poland and Brasil) through the medium of zines and samizdat (1960s-to the present), photographs and video material (interviews). It was centred around the stories queer (João Silvério Trevisan, Ryszard Kisiel) and transgender (Laerte Coutinho, Ewa Hołuszko) artists and activists who were censored and in some cases imprisoned by authoritarian (Communist/ right-wing) regimes in Poland and Brasil, in order to re-claims their place in their national histories and reflect on the meaning of their activism in the light of today’s ‘gender wars’.
The presentation was followed by the discussion with key network members Prof Flavia Biroli, Dr Felipe Bruno Martins Fernandes, Prof Agnieszka Kościańska, Dr Nicolette Makovicky, Prof Hadley Renkin, Prof Conny Roggeband.
