Denver PrideFest 2011: The Center Presents PRIDE Tease - A Retrospective of Pride Ts

Debuting on Friday, June 10 and running through the month of June, The GLBT Community Center of Colorado (The Center) will present ‘PRIDE Tease: A Retrospective of Pride T-Shirts’. This exhibit will help to chronicle Colorado's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender history and evolution through the display of Pride T-shirts, newspaper clippings and magazine articles, photos, posters and other memorabilia.

For decades T-shirts have been worn to demonstrate a person’s unique qualities, lifestyle or opinions. They have also been used to represent memories, demonstrate belief systems, or provide a means for people to band together and express who they are. People wore and continue to wear T-shirts to say something about the type of person they are … without ever having to say a word.

‘PRIDE Tease: A Retrospective of Pride T-Shirts’ will span 34 years of LGBT history. In 1977, members of Colorado’s LGBT community were wearing T-shirts that said “I Am ‘One’ Are You?” We wore these T-shirts to express our identities. It was a way for us to build community in public without fear of persecution or harm. Today, the message may seem too subtle, but back then it was a bold public statement. In 1986, our T-shirts read “Unified in Pride” and symbolized the strength we took from and gave back to our LGBT brothers and sisters. By 1997, Denver’s anti-gay Amendment 2 had been overturned and we celebrated our victories by wearing T-shirts that proclaimed that we were “Weaving a Community of Strength.” And by the first millennial decade, LGBT Pride had become a brand - a powerful identity - that left nothing unsaid.

Over the past four decades – 1970’s to the 2000’s – The Center, Denver PrideFest, and Colorado’s LGBT community have used our T’s to tease the straight public by communicating with each other under their noses while slowly educating them to be more accepting of the LGBT community as our messages became bolder and more “in your face.” And every one of you who has worn a PrideFest T-shirt has contributed to the LGBT rights movement. Whether you wore it at PrideFest, the grocery store, among friends, at a family gathering, at work or anywhere in public, you have stood proud in your identity and for your community.


The Center hopes that ‘PRIDE Tease: A Retrospective of Pride T-Shirts’ provides you with an educational and historical perspective of our movement in Colorado, empowers you to always be proud of whom you are, and reminds you to always celebrate the rich diversity of our community.