New Women’s Mural Girlifies Bloomingdale Block
Bloomingdale is quickly becoming a queer girl's paradise.
Between the cute staff at Big Bear, the cheap beer bars, the flourishing farmer's market and the sidewalks teeming with cutoff-clad dykes, I rarely leave my house without feeling like I've stepped through a wormhole into Northampton, Mass.
A new mural on my very own block at Quincy Place & Florida Avenue NW makes the neighborhood even more female-friendly. With a vibrant color palette and a strong focus on women of color, this eye-catching wall of a private home pays homage to important figures in women's history, including D.C.'s own Mary Church Terrell and famous bisexual Frida Kahlo.
It was produced by Albus Cavus and executed by a diverse group of female street artists in March. The Mautner Project, the nation's only organization devoted to lesbian health, has signed on as a promotional partner.
Albus Cavus has set forth some admirable, if ambitious, goals for the piece:
The goal is to visually transform the area and provide a forum for discussion relevant to women [sic] rights in our local and global communities.
Women artists who specialize in street art, public art and graffiti do not experience equal representation of women within these art forms. Like other forms of artistic expression born out of the urban experience, public art has been traditionally dominated by men. Yet, powerful works by women abound. These works ultimately enrich the art scene, providing alternate perspectives and diversifying its message and its relevance.
Come by the hood and take a look! This mural could become the latest informal queer chick meet-up joint...(in my dreams). See more photos here and here.
When Christina isn't writing for WTGG, she's assassinating dance floors in purple high-tops, causing bike accidents, taming the wilderness, practicing her beatboxing and begging Erykah Badu to cast her in a music video. A big, 90's-inspired ball of sass, Christina's greatest mission - driven by a dilettante interest in science - is to try everything once (maybe twice) and find out how the world works. She's the queirdest girl you know.