19 Photos Celebrate the Beauty of SCUM
07/11/19
xtyfr
Pictured: "Drag Surfin' USA". Courtesy of Anthony Mehlhaff, 2019
Club SCUM celebrates three years of the monthly party where queer punk POC gather to create, dance, sweat, feel safe, and transcend the routines of everyday life.
In Pasadena, the Armory Center for the Arts is pleased to present Club SCUM: Three Year Anniversary Exhibition at the Armory Center for the Arts from Sunday, June 23 through Sunday, September 15, 2019in the Armory's Mezzanine Gallery.
Photo by Ian Byers-Gamber. Courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
Inspired by Latinx spaces, queer punk, and tea parties of the past, SCUM is a monthly queer punk POC party at Chico on the border of East Los Angeles and Montebello. SCUM is community space to gather, create, dance, sweat, feel safe, and escape the routine of everyday life.
"Limp Wrist sCUM 2 Year Anniversary". Courtesy of Albert Licano, 2018.
Founded by Rudy "Bleu" Garcia and Ray Sanchez, Club SCUM is a boundary-pushing, community-building, punk club platform that welcomes everyone into a safe space for queer Latinx youth. SCUM, boasts its organizers, "is Raw Filthy Punk Drag Performance and Dance." Prior to starting Club Scum two years ago, Garcia and Sanchez were well-known Los Angeles-based DJs and event organizers in a predominantly white punk community. Recognizing a desire for queer punk among youth of color, they started Club Scum in Montebello, on the edge of East Los Angeles. Since then the project has expanded beyond Los Angeles to pop-ups in New York, Mexico City, and San Francisco.
Photo by Ian Byers-Gamber. Courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
With its focus on diverse drag styles, performers, and identities that don't fit into stereotypes, "the Club Scum experience is beholden to no one sound or genre," according to a recent article in the Los Angeles Times. "Club Scum as celebrates the anomalous within an already marginalized community...specifically focusing on intersectionality and celebrating people of color. ... Ultimately, creating a home and family for misfits is the core value for Club Scum."
"Blaue Tara". Courtesy of Amina Cruz, 2017.
As Club SCUM enters its third year, an exhibition at the Armory celebrates this milestone with an exhibition in its Mezzanine Gallery of ephemera and photographs taken at the club by its patrons. The exhibition honors the history of LGBTQ activism, including actions as early as 1959, when police harrassment in downtown Los Angeles at the Cooper Do-nuts prompted an uprising. The Armory's exhibition coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising in New York City, a series of protests against police raids of Stonewall Inn, a mainstay of gay club culture in Greenwich Village. The Stonewall uprising, ten years later and better known than the incident at Cooper Do-nuts, is considered a catalyst in what came to be called the gay liberation movement and today's advocacy for LGBTQ rights.
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
According to Julio Salgado, an artist affiliated with Club SCUM: "What people need to understand is that in time of crisis, we cannot let our spirit to be killed by the powers that be. Parties like Club SCUM allow the Latinx weirdos who grew up listening to punk and rock en espanol get together and forget at least for one night that we are allowed to celebrate ourselves even if politicians and white supremacists cannot see our humanity."
"Crowd Shot". Courtesy of Amina Cruz, 2017
About the Armory
Armory Center for the Arts, in Pasadena, California, is one of the Los Angeles region's leading independent institutions for contemporary art and community arts education. The Armory believes that an understanding and appreciation of the arts is essential for a well-rounded human experience and a healthy civic community. Founded in 1989, the Armory builds on the power of art to transform lives and communities through presenting, creating, teaching, and considering contemporary visual art. The organization's department of exhibitions offers diverse programs at its main facility and in locations throughout the region. Armory exhibitions inspire dialogue around visual culture and contemporary life; contribute to global discourses in contemporary art; include residency programs that encourage experimentation and outreach; and introduce contemporary visual art to Pasadena, the Los Angeles region, and beyond. The Armory also offers studio art classes and related educational programs to more than fifty schools, community sites, and juvenile justice centers in the greater Los Angeles area.
Admission to the Armory is free. Parking is available on the street or in the Marriott garage directly north of the Armory for free for 90 minutes. The Armory is off the Gold Line at Memorial Park - walk one half block east to Raymond and one half block north to the Armory. For more information please visit www.armoryarts.org.
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
"Fasique". Courtesy of Martha Quintero, 2019.
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
"Dusk". Courtesy of Martha Quintero, 2018.
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
Image courtesy Club SCUM and Armory Center for the Arts
Photo courtesy Armory
Image courtesy Club SCUM and Armory Center for the Arts
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
Image courtesy Club SCUM and Armory Center for the Arts
Photo courtesy Armory Center for the Arts
Image courtesy Club SCUM and Armory Center for the Arts
Latest Stories
