Opening reception for Playing for Ourselves, Playing for a Revolution: A History of Queer and Feminist Punk in San Francisco highlights the legacies of queer and women performers, bands and scene makers who shaped San Francisco’s punk and new wave scene during the late 1970s and early to mid–1980s. The exhibition celebrates the empowering connections between punk’s early days in San Francisco and the queer liberation and women’s rights movements. Bands like the Avengers, the Nuns, the Offs, Screamers, Romeo Void and Frightwig are represented.

The exhibition explores how punk culture fit into San Francisco’s free-spirited and progressive artistic ethos, allowing queer and women musicians to create unique communities distinct from major punk hubs like New York, London and Los Angeles. These artists harnessed punk’s energy and immediacy for self-expression to challenge the issues and injustices faced by women and queer communities. While primarily focused on the first decade of San Francisco punk (1977–1986), the exhibition also features items from Bay Area queer and feminist punk in the late 1980s to the present, highlighting the enduring influence that made San Francisco punk so special in the first place.

Light refreshments will be served.

Exhibition curated by Kit Ortega, USF Museum Studies Program—Intern for the San Francisco History Center.

Photo credit: The Situations performing at the Mabuhay Gardens from the San Francisco Punk Collection.