The World is a Rainbow

Each and every human makes the world the place it is today. Every human is a different colour, Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, Purple. They all have an individual identity, they blend together to form the streak of colour which is most appreciated.

Why colours today? Because they make everything interesting. Sometimes some of the colours lose their identity when they are overshadowed by others when they start considering themselves as misfits according to the rules of social beliefs. Because of their sexual or gender preferences, society is unable to accept them, resulting in them rejecting themselves too.

Today we are here to enlighten those multi-coloured souls, who, even after all the hardship, decided to leave the world with a print of their intentions. Their creativity spoke louder with time, who decided to make their own identity bigger than what people perceived. As you will go towards the end of the article you will be thrilled with surprises, reading about the personalities whom you knew about, but never knew enough.

The Lesbian, The Gay, The Bi-sexual, The Transgender, and The Queer (LGBTQ) the ones who were scared of coming out of the closet afraid of losing their prime identity, made it to the top and motivating others like themselves to come out Shine brighter. Let’s focus more on their contribution towards Art.

I would like to start with the one star, who decided never to give up, a personal favourite, Fredie Mercury. A soul of a Lion. Born as Farrokh Bulsara ( 5th September 1946–24 November 1991) were a British-Indian singer, songwriter, record producer, and lead vocalist of the rock band “Queen”. Regarded as one of the greatest singers in the history of rock music, he was known for his flamboyant stage persona and four-octave vocal range. Mercury defied the conventions of a rock frontman, with his highly theatrical style he influenced the artistic direction of “Queen”. The band is known for its evergreen creation “ Bohemian Rhapsody “.

The next legend, Sir Elton Hercules John, born on 25 March 1947 (age 74 years), Pinner, United Kingdom. Known as Elton John, is an English singer, songwriter, pianist, and composer. He has been collaborating with lyricist Bernie Taupin since 1967 on more than 30 albums, John has sold over 300 million records, making him one of the best-selling music artists of all time.

LGBT music spans the entire spectrum of popular music. Lyricism and song content typically express the frustration, anxiety, and hope associated with non-normative sexual and gender identities, offering marginalized groups a vital platform for expression. Recently, popular music has provided an arena where marginalized voices can be heard and sexual identities shaped, challenged and renegotiated. Mainstream music has begun to reflect the acceptance of LGBT and queer musicianship. Some queer icons are openly queer-identifying and have made impactful changes in the world for LGBT people. Others are straight allies that have expressed their support for the community.

Some other examples are Ricky Martin, Lady Gaga and Troye Sivan etc. who really stepped out of their comfort zone to express themselves honestly to the world. Ricky Martin has said “ My life has never been better, after telling everyone that I am Gay “ and that’s respectful.

Not just the music industry, the LGBT gang has been everywhere and has been present among us waiting for us to accept them.

Leonardo Da Vinci — Italian painter, designer, sculptor, inventor, scientist, architect, and Engineer, the painter of the world-renowned painting Mona Lisa, Leonardo Da Vinci, born on April 15, 1452 — Anchiano, Tuscany, is such an example that his name is engraved in the history. He defined new limits to Art and Science that still have not been achieved yet.

Michelangelo — Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, commonly known as Michelangelo is one of art history’s earliest true “characters.” He was a polymath genius who is widely considered to be one of the greatest artists of the Italian Renaissance period even while acquiring a reputation for being temper driven, fickle, and difficult. He was part of the revival of classical Greek and Roman art, yet his unique contributions went beyond mere mimicry of antiquity. His work was infused with a psychological intensity and emotional realism that had never been seen before and often caused quite a bit of controversy. Several scholars have described Michelangelo as the greatest artist of his age and even as the greatest artist of all time.

Robert Rauschenberg born on October 22, 1925, at Port Arthur, Texas, is a renowned name from our history of Art making who introduced changes to the predominant styles of painting. White Paintings- Originally viewed as a scandalous swindle, Rauschenberg’s White Paintings were an early codification of the artistic ideals that dominated his entire oeuvre. The White Paintings currently exist in five different permutations of multi-panelled canvases, which Rauschenberg intentionally left free of any mark of the artist’s hand.

Further, on the journey of digging the history of Art, we found poets and writers on the way too

-C.P. Cavafy, was is a 20th-century Greek poet, known for his highly homoerotic and sexually explicit poetry. While he remained mostly obscure during his lifetime, he’s now come to be revered as one of the great gay poets of the past hundred years.

-Audre Lorde, Self-described as “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet,” Lorde is a leading queer and feminist voice in the world of literature, especially poetry. She’s quoted in an interview with Callaloo as saying: “My sexuality is part and parcel of who I am, and my poetry comes from the intersection of me and my worlds…”

-Adrienne Rich A lesbian and feminist pioneer, Rich’s poetry has cemented itself as canon in American literature. Her collections, such as A Change of World (1951) and Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law: Poems 1954–1962 (1963), explore identity and have been praised critically.

-Federico Garcia Lorca, The Spanish poet was a contemporary of such artists as Salvador Dali and Luis Buñuel. His work often incorporates elements of fantasy and folklore.

-Frank O’Hara — O’Hara was active in the mid-20th century in New York City. He was also a respected art critic and curator.

-Ifti Nasim, was a gay Pakistani-American poet who moved to the States to escape persecution for his sexuality back in his hometown. He became known for establishing Sangat, a group that supports LGBT south-Asian youth.

-James Baldwin — Baldwin is known as one of the great, proud gay artists of all time. His work is unabashedly queer and intersectional. While he’s best known for his novels, like Notes of A Native Son and Giovanni’s Room, he was also a celebrated poet.

-Walt Whitman — Walt Whitman is one of the great poets of all time and a champion of homoeroticism in the literary form. He’s celebrated for his collection Leaves of Grass as one of the great world poets in history.

The list will go on as we keep writing more and more about them, appreciating the kind of jewels our history holds.

India, our very own nation, holds a history of artists who could finally come out and reveal their gender preferences and sexuality after legalisation, according to the judiciary. Some of the great examples are,

-Tista Das or Teesta Das is an Indian transgender rights activist, actor and writer from the Indian state of West Bengal. She acted in quite a few Hindi and Bengali films.

-Laxmi Narayan Tripathi is a transgender/Eunuch rights activist, Bollywood actress, Bharatanatyam dancer, choreographer and motivational speaker in Mumbai, India. She is also the Acharya Mahamandaleshwar of kinnar akhada. She was born in Malti Bai Hospital on 13th Dec 1978 in Thane.

-Onir is an Indian film and TV director, editor, screenwriter and producer. He is best known for his film My Brother…Nikhil, based on the life of Dominic d’Souza, starring Sanjay Suri and Purab Kohli Nikhil was one of the first mainstream Hindi films to deal with AIDS and same-sex relationships.

More films of Onir, popular from the history of Bollywood are I am — 2010, Bas ek pal — 2006, Chauranga — 2014 My brother Nikhil — 2005.

-Gauri Sawant is a transgender activist from Mumbai, India. She is the director of Sakhi Char Chowghi that helps transgender people and people with HIV/AIDS. She was featured in an ad by Vicks. She was made the goodwill ambassador of the Election Commission in Maharashtra.

-Sushant Divgikar is an Indian model, actor, singer, columnist, psychologist, motivational speaker, drag queen, pageant director, and video jockey. In July 2014, he was crowned Mr Gay India 2014. He represented India at Mr Gay World 2014.

-Hoshang Dinshaw Merchant is a poet from India. Most of his writings are in English. He is best known for his anthology on gay writing titled Yaarana.

-Ashok Row Kavi is an Indian journalist and LGBT rights activist.

-Ramchandra Siras was an Indian linguist and author. He was a professor at the Aligarh Muslim University specializing in Marathi literature and head of the Department of Modern Indian Languages. The film Aligarh, directed by Hansal Mehta, is based on his life.

Surprisingly, the academics have been a witness of a brave LGBT activist who is a Professor of Philosophy currently.

-Manabi Bandyopadhyay was born in Naihati, West Bengal in an educated family as Somnath Bandyopadhyay. She is the first transgender professor and first transgender person in India who has completed Doctor of Philosophy in India.

To summarize the purpose of today’s word between You and Us was to bring awareness to our knowledge of our own history. The faces who have contributed in making the society we live in. Because equality comes from the mindset. God created everyone, for everyone to respect each other.

Art has no language, no preferences, no boundaries to follow. Art is a result of imagination and how well you turn that imagination into reality. Our gratitude will always be with the creative minds, who make this world a better place to live in.

Art Ho!

Written by Harsh Srivastava