“Queerness is primarily about futurity and hope. That is to say that queerness is always in the horizon.”
–José Esteban Muñoz
Where does the energy of a party go after it’s over? How can spaces of connection, especially queer dance parties, gay bars, karaoke, and the environments they create enable us to imagine the future? In this exhibition, I explore the significance of club and living room dance floors alike and what it feels like to look back and savor sweet moments. In my most utopian dreams, a queer dance party embodies everything that is craved and missing from the day-to-day, carving space for a world that is accepting and beyond its current constraints. I make layered drawings, photographs, and prints to explore the multiple outcomes possible in both the physical process of making repeated imagery and the disciplined hopefulness necessary for a better future. In a world that is unsafe for queer people and multitudes of identities, I’d like to think another world is possible. Through my work, I imagine places like a dance floor or a karaoke bar as ways to dream up what we wish.
Gaby Hurtado-Ramos is an artist and educator making drawings, prints, zines, and multimedia work around the cracks and glimmers of queer social life. Their publishing practice is called Rear-View Press, a solo and collaborative risograph printing endeavor making zines loosely around themes of nostalgia. They have completed residencies at Penland School of Craft (North Carolina), The Printing Museum (Houston, TX), Dirt Palace (Providence, RI), and The Wedding Cake House (Providence, RI). As a resident artist in 2021 at The Printing Museum, they published a zine documenting lesbian bar history in Houston. From 2023-2025 they served on the board of Southern Graphics Council International (SGCI). They have taught courses and workshops nationwide, including at The Women’s Studio Workshop (Rosendale, NY), the Tennessee Art Education Association, the University of Tennessee, and Art League Houston. Gaby’s work has been shared and exhibited in print and zine expositions, academic archives, and galleries. Their illustration work has been commissioned by ProPublica, the Highlander Research and Education Center, and the Tucson Jewish Museum. Gaby received their BA from Oberlin College and their MFA from the University of Tennessee Knoxville.
Website: gabyhurtado.com
Instagram: @gabyhurtadoramos
