Tag Archives: Gay Couples

New Book Sheds Light on Vintage LGBT Experience

The Invisibles 07Nowadays we live in a relatively tolerant society where LGBT people enjoy equal rights under the law. But it wasn’t always like this. As many books and films from the early to middle 20th century show, life for lesbians and gays was all about pain, suffering, abuse and prejudice.

Or was it? The photographer Sebastian Lifshtiz would beg to differ. His new book of photographs entitled The Invisibles: Vintage Portraits of Love and Pride shows dozens of LGBTs from the first few decades of the 1900s – and many of them look positively proud and content with their lives.

According to Lifshitz, cross-dressing was popular in Britain and the US in the Roaring Twenties and sexual ambiguity seemed to dominate the nightlife of that period. Even during the conservative post-World War II years LGBTs were able to be themselves, although they had to be a little quieter about it than their contemporary counterparts.

Lifshitz found the old photos in flea markets and jumble sales and, brought together, they form a ‘gentle and playful’ narrative that reveals ‘homosexuality without inhibitions.’

Much is left to the viewer’s imagination as the pictures come with no captions or any contextual detail at all. We don’t know who these people are and we don’t know the true nature of their relationships. The chapters have not been organised chronologically or according to different themes.

The Invisibles: Vintage Portraits of Love and Pride is also the name of Lifshitz’s Cesar Award-winning film which does offer a little more background information than the book.

#LoveTravels when you can be yourself – New Campaign Marriott

As part of Marriott International’s #LoveTravels campaign, LGBT couples share their genuine love for one another that they feel translates into a language people can understand, no matter their beliefs.

#LoveTravels when you can be yourself — whoever you are and wherever you go. We partnered with renowned photographer Braden Summers to capture beautiful portraits that show the world how love travels the moment you walk through our doors.

#LoveTravels – www.marriottlovetravels.com

The campaign also features NBA star Jason Collins. Collins, who was the first openly gay NBA player, spending some of this past season with the Nets, will be featured in ads for Marriott to help promote the campaign.

“I think these romantic images of same-sex couples, it’s something the general public is going to relate to and slowly people will become accustomed to seeing that kind of romance.”

Braden Summers, campaign photographer

This new social media and marketing campaign is set to target Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community. Marriott’s campaign is the latest example of the hotel industry stepping up its efforts to lure LGBT travellers. While the company says it is targeting the community to make LGBT travellers feel more welcome, there’s also a business incentive.

According to Out Now Global, an LGBT marketing specialist group, the potential value of the LGBT travel market was set to reach $181 billion last year.

Ami and Laura #LoveTravels

Meet Talisha and Monica #LoveTravels

Bollywood embraces gay couples in new video

Yesterday, India movie and music scene made a stand by embracing gay couples in a new Bollywood video. In support of LGBTI equality around the world, the UN’s Free & Equal campaign releases a new music video to encourage change in India.

Free & Equal is an initiative by the United Nations Human Rights Office’s to push for LGBT rights around the world. The video stars actress and former Miss India Celina Jaitly, who last year was nominated as a UN equality champion for her support of LGBT equality.

‘It is an honor to partner with the United Nations on the incredibly timely and important Free & Equal campaign. I have been working for LGBT rights for many years, and I am honored to contribute my musical debut to such a good cause. Music is a universal language. It can engage people’s passion, and that’s when good things happen.’

Celina Jaitly

Sadly, the video comes after India’s Supreme Court’s decision to re-criminalise homosexuality in December 2013. The Supreme Court caused a global outcry by re-installing Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, originally enacted in 1860 by the British colonial regime, to criminalise gay or lesbian sex, punishable with life imprisonment.

Numerous human rights groups and activists have protested the decision, with the Supreme Court agreeing to hear a contest in court this month.

‘LGBT people have historically been marginalized and subjected to discrimination and violence in India, as elsewhere. But change is coming. In the past few months we have seen an unprecedented level of public debate relating to the rights of LGBT people. As awareness grows, attitudes will change. We need to do all we can to hasten change by challenging the myths and misinformation that get in the way of understanding. That is what this campaign is all about.’

Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

Watch The Welcome – United Nations Free & Equal

‘KEEP CALM BECAUSE LOVE IS LOVE’ – we love these prints

I am loving these custom prints from Keep Calm-o-matic. This site is great, not only do they sell fantastic prints but they also allow you the chance to create your own.

The ‘Keep Calm’ phenomenon has now been around for 5 years. YES, back in the mists of time, in early 2009, the phenomenon hit are purchasing needs. Posters started to appear everywhere; from news articles to the police (who got into the act with their Policing Pledge posters), we have seen every variation of this print, but the history behind the original posters is quite fascinating.

The Keep Calm and Carry On posters were originally created by the UK Ministry of Information in order to boost the morale of the British people during World War II. The message was meant to have come directly from King George VI himself, with the original being stark white text on a red background, with the only image on the poster being the royal crown of George VI.

However, the intention of this poster was to only be displayed if invasion was imminent, and because of this happened they never got distributed. So, at the end of the war, the posters were collected up and pulped. It is believed that only two original posters, from the millions created actually survived.

The story would have ended there were it not for Stuart and Mary Manley, who run a bookshop called Barter Books in Northumberland. Whilst sorting through a box of old books, they found one of the few surviving original copies of the ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ poster. They liked it so much that they had the poster framed and placed near the till in their shop.

They soon found that customers were very keen on the poster – even to the point of asking if they could buy it! So, Stuart and Mary started selling and printing facsimilie copies of the poster. The rest, as they say, is history…

To purchase or find out more go to http://www.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk

Watch: Love is Love Film 28 LGBT Alaskan Families

In the summer of 2012 Shalem Mathew and Mitch Kitter started the Love is Love project. During the first stage of the project they photographed 28 Vibrant LGBT families from all over Alaska. Thru out the project filmmaker April Frame recorded video, interviewed couples, and compiled a video that is sure to leave you misty eyed.

Couples declare that “Love is Love” in gorgeous LGBT photo project

More than two years ago, a young woman was having head shots taken at Treft.Punkt, in Alaska. During her shoot, she asked the photographer, Shalem Matthew, about wedding engagement shoots.

“Do you photograph all kinds of people?” She asked.

Shalem was a bit confused. “I think we do,” he started. “What do you mean ‘all kinds of people’?”

“Like, do you photograph all kinds of couples?,” she clarified. “Like, an engagement with two women.” She explained that she had approached two other local photographers, and they turned her and her girlfriend down.

Shalem smiled, nodded: “Of course.”

The young woman had come to the perfect studio: Shalem owned Propaganda AK with his partner, Mitch Kitter.

This experience lit a spark for Shalem and Mitch, who found it disheartening that same-sex couples like the young woman were denied by photographers and told that their love is not worth documenting.

“Love is love – all love is equal,” Mitch thought, and quickly, he and Shalem began planning a new project – the “Love is Love” project, a photography exhibit and book featuring 28 same-sex couples from across Alaska.

The project officially launched in October 2012 with an exhibit in Anchorage, and soon, Mitch and Shalem will be embarking on a more expansive tour through the United States, arranging new photo shoots with other loving same-sex couples in the country, many of whom are still denied the freedom to marry.

“Love is Love” is not just a gorgeous photography project. It is not just a creative method of advocating for same-sex couples and their freedoms in Alaska. It is both of those things – but it is more than that: it is a beautiful celebration of love, an affirmation of people who have committed their lives to each other, a reminder that the nationwide discussion over the freedom to marry involves real people, a loud and strong and compelling and simple declaration: love is love.

Here, Freedom to Marry caught up with 10 of the Alaska couples who participated in Mitch and Shalem’s Love is Love project. Read their stories, and watch a video at the end of the post featuring more great families and their stories. Check out Love is Love’s official website, and follow the project on Facebook HERE.

Original Source – http://www.freedomtomarry.org/blog/entry/alaska-couples-show-the-world-that-love-is-love-in-gorgeous-photo-project

Stunning Photography of Gay Couples All Over The Globe

Photography Braden Summers, traveled to six different countries to take this series of photo, which prove that no matter where you are, love is equal. As a gay man, Braden was tired of the LGBT community being misrepresented in media imagery – or worse absent completely. He decided to take matters into his own hands. He traveled all over the world to create dramatised romantic scenes featuring only gay couples. The results are beautiful, with real meaning and LOVE.