Zimmerli Art Museum celebrates GAYpril with Brooklyn-based art collective Papi Juice
Kyle Carrero Lopez reads an excerpt of his book | Photo by Keya Raval
The Zimmerli Art Museum celebrated Queer Pride at their monthly Sparknight event on Thursday. GAYpril is a commemoration of LGBTQIA+ cultural history that spans the month of April, observed throughout college campuses that are out of session during Pride Month in June.
Papi Juice, an art and music collective that celebrates the lives of queer and trans people of color, collaborated with the Museum to host DJ sets, workshops, and a poetry reading. The American Art Gallery debuted a new rotation of works, alongside the special exhibition of Andy Warhol’s On Repeat!.
Daniel Báez, Oscar Nñ, and Love Higher performed DJ sets to open the evening, followed by poet Kyle Carrero Lopez. Newark-based DJ, songwriter, and music producer UNIIQU3 presented a performance-lecture exploring Jersey club music. All the performers of the evening have roots in New Jersey.
Carrero Lopez read an excerpt from his upcoming poetry collection “Party Line,” exploring how queer culture contributes to spaces of solidarity and empowerment. His first full-length collection will be released in July. He told WRSU, “I’m glad that I can be a part of the gay festivities, bring some poetry into the gaiety.”
The evening’s art activity, held in collaboration with Scarlet Arts Rx, was to create one’s own “Jersey Club” persona with a collaged self-portrait. Angel, a Rutgers student with the organization, said that “it is so nice to get to see people doing art and taking part in art in these material ways. There’s a lot of really cool queer people in New Jersey making really cool art!”
Special guest UNIIQU3 detailed the intricacies of Jersey club production in a workshop. Dubbed the “Queen of Jersey Club,” she hosts her show “Club Queen Radio” on SiriusXM, has worked with Chloe Bailey, and won a Broadcast Music, Inc. R&B/Hip-Hop Award in 2023.
In a conversation with WRSU, she spoke about the importance of curating musical knowledge at a university like Rutgers, and how working at a radio station has guided her. “The queer community means everything to me, I’ve always been about the girls and the gays as long as I’ve been a DJ – that’s how I found my home. College radio means everything, it’s where I really decided I could make DJ’ing a career. When you’re working on radio, you are a music journalist, you guys are documentarians too. When are we gonna get this Jersey club 101 production class going so we can make some more Jersey bangers and donate some of the proceeds of the viral songs?”
The Museum will continue to host Gaypril events throughout the month, with free attendance open to all.
Nina Davis contributed to this story.