Artist Talk – The Artist Oeuvre Series: Part 2

Gay Now, Gay Later & Amor No Binario

Join us for an afternoon of conversation with the Anna Raquel & Nayelli Rosas the artist behind Gay Now, Gay Later & Amor No Binario, respectively.  

This conversation takes us through the creation and curation of each powerfully stunning art project that celebrate queer joy. Raquel & Rosas reflect on their exploration of gender expression, safe placemaking, and cultural ties; while amplifying the importance of queer visibility.

RSVP by clicking the button below. Please note, seating is limited. Seating priority will be given to early arrivals, elders, and people with disabilities.

About the Projects

Gay Now, Gay Later explores tattooing as a form of community care, queer expression, and cultural storytelling within San Francisco’s queer Latinx communities. The project reinterprets the classic Chicano phrase “Smile Now, Cry Later” — popularized through Chicano tattoo culture and artist Freddy Negrete — to center queer Latino identities and experiences through Chicano-style tattooing.

Rooted in the artist’s Latina heritage, queer identity, and Bay Area upbringing, the work combines Chicano and American traditional tattoo aesthetics with queer visual culture. Through hand-drawn tattoo flash sheets, documentary-style video, and film photography, the project highlights themes of gender affirmation, bodily autonomy, self-expression, and collective healing. One flash sheet references drag, ballroom, and leather cultures, while another draws from San Francisco iconography including Victorian houses, local wildlife, area codes, and street culture.

Developed through free tattoo sessions with queer BIPOC participants across neighborhoods such as the Mission District, Tenderloin, Bayview, and Excelsior, the project foregrounds tattooing as an intimate, service-based practice rooted in storytelling and human connection. Participants shared how tattoos can memorialize personal histories, affirm identity, and create confidence and belonging. By documenting these experiences, Gay Now, Gay Later positions the body as an archive and tattooing as a practice of visibility, care, and cultural preservation.

Amor No Binario explores the intersections of queer identity, relationships, and cultural expectations within the Latinx community in the Bay Area. Through interviews and portrait photography, Rosas documents the lived experiences of six queer Latinx participants with diverse identities, including nonbinary, femme, masc, and trans individuals.

Centered on storytelling and intimacy, the project combines hour-long recorded conversations with portraits created in spaces personally meaningful to each participant. Emerging from discussions around queer love, chosen family, gender exploration, rejection and acceptance, public visibility, and intergenerational memory, the work examines how identity is shaped through culture, environment, and community.

The resulting photo series captures moments of vulnerability, confidence, and connection while reflecting resistance to restrictive ideas surrounding gender, sexuality, and cultural norms within Latinx communities. Clothing, jewelry, religious objects, and personal style become visual markers of memory, nostalgia, and self-expression. By foregrounding authentic experiences of queer Latinx life, the project invites viewers to reconsider conventional understandings of identity and embrace the complexity and many forms of queer love, belonging, and selfhood.

About The AO Series

The AO Series represents a significant investment in San Francisco’s creative arts sector, directly funding 15 artists and regranting $250K over the past two years. This series highlights the work of six grantees, offering the public an opportunity to experience the depth, regenerative spirit, and at times collaborative nature of each artist’s completed body of work.

These projects were made possible through the ReGen Artist Fund, a small grants program that pairs financial support with professional development. In addition to funding, participating artists receive training in grant writing and program planning, equipping them to develop competitive proposals for future opportunities. The fund is as much a commitment to artistic growth as it is to community investment. Encouraged to think critically about how art can reshape societal narratives, these artists examine their roles as cultural bearers while addressing stories and perspectives often overlooked in today’s politically charged climate.