Bex Wade

I’m proud to share that my writing is in the Summer 2025 issue of @artreview_magazine This is the first time a commissioned piece of mine has appeared in print where my words lead, not my photos. That shift feels interesting and intriguing. The piece is personal, shaped by years of experience and the daily reality of moving through a world that often doesn’t make space for people like me. Writing it carried weight. Sharing it feels like showing a wound. Right now, being trans means living on the sharp edge. Fighting over laws, bathrooms, places we’re told don’t belong to us. To say this from a trans perspective in a respected art publication feels rare and necessary. This isn’t just about being seen. It’s about being witnessed. About the difference between existing as a headline and just being one of those people it relates to. I’m deeply grateful to @fi_churchman , who invited me to write this piece after visiting my solo show. It grew out of the conversations we had in that space, thoughtful, generous ones that stayed with us both. “In moments like this, when the law fails us, when public discourse runs cold — art can become a shelter. Not one of retreat, but of resistance. A space where we write ourselves back into history. Where we care for each other in public. Where we refuse the terms we’ve been given.” Being able to write this piece is the epitome of just that. I hope everyone who reads my words, trans or not, feels that care.

Thank you to @veritybabbsart for writing about my @young.vam installation and the @vamuseum in this lovely article for @artnet 🧡 I’m thrilled to have this news out there and it still feels utterly surreal 💫🏳️‍⚧️

📣 MORE EXCITING NEWS 📣 ———————————————————————————— I have been photographing my queer community in the UK and globally for the past 19 years. Recording these spaces, from dance floors to demos, both as a way to capture their community but also as a means of archiving a queer form of gathering and expression. Moving from the club into the street, documenting Pride and protest worldwide I have continued to explore a sense of belonging. I could never have imagined that seeing my work on the walls of such a prestigious museum would bring me such a sense of belonging too. Growing up under section 28, I’ve become conscious of how toxic and familiar the narrative around trans rights feels right now. I believe being that able to see ourselves in our places of learning, cultural spaces and on the walls of large institutions like the @vamuseum is vital to building a sense of who we are when we’re young. It’s such an honour that my image of trans protest will reside permanently in the @young.vam and will be seen by so many visitors, carrying a powerful message to all who view it. Trans children don’t deserve to be used as pawns in games of power or politics. Instead, they simply are a blessing.

Very proud to contribute to this excellent publication. Issue three of @thebittersweetreview , 𝘛𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘜𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘛𝘰 𝘉𝘦 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘍𝘶𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦, brings together so many trans and queer artists and writers whom I hugely admire. I have loved this publication for years, so being featured in this issue now feels affirming, timely, and a wonderful way to begin the year. I have nine images in the issue, alongside a piece of writing that allowed me to think through queer futurity as something unstable, fractured, and deeply personal. I write about what it means to imagine a future while living inside a present that often feels hostile to trans lives, and how that tension shapes how I move, make work, and survive. Very grateful to @kole_fulmine and Louis for including me. Thrilled to be featured alongside @arca1000000 , @ladydangfua , @caconrad88 , Mijke van der Drift, @full_nommunism , @donna.the.first , @emily_ferrone , Victoria Vaccaro Garcia, @boixleo , K Lewis Hood, @steliosilchuk , @lauren_i_joseph , David McDiarmid, @jakmerriman , @ekmyerson , @emily_pope90 , @sinforvictory , @epastry , @p___staff , @pierceeldridge , @lindastupart , Emil Woudenberg, and @paige.eakin.young . Issue three launches tonight at @loveaffairbasement . I cannot wait to celebrate the birth of this beauty 💙

NEW WORK ————————————————————————————
𝘿𝙤𝙣’𝙩 𝙇𝙤𝙤𝙠 𝘽𝙖𝙘𝙠, @unitlondon , curated by @sigridakirk and @bethgreenacre_london 
25 Sept – 26 Oct ———————————————————————————— 𝘗𝘪𝘦𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘜𝘴, is a large-scale work exploring community, gathering, and the politics of space through images made between 2006 and 2025. It traces bodies on dance floors, in marches, and in moments of shared joy, intimacy, and resistance. This work probes the tension between lived experience and the commodification of queerness; asking what it means to hold, circulate, and collect memory that risks being erased or threatened, and whether an archive can ever truly be owned. Each image is presented as a tear-off poster pad. They rest on fragments of reclaimed dance floor, a material trace of the space some of these pictures were made on. Purchasing and tearing a print is itself a performative gesture, an act of risk and care that echoes how queer life is often lived. One signed collector’s edition print remains on each pad, holding the work in the gallery and priced accordingly. 𝗣𝗶𝗲𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗨𝘀:
𝘾𝙤𝙡𝙡𝙖𝙥𝙨𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙖 𝙐𝙣𝙞𝙤𝙣 (2006)
𝙄𝙛 𝙑𝙞𝙨𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙄𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙊𝙣𝙡𝙮 𝙑𝙖𝙡𝙞𝙙𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 (2009)
𝙋𝙧𝙞𝙙𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙋𝙡𝙖𝙘𝙚 (2022)
𝙄 𝙃𝙖𝙫𝙚 𝙎𝙞𝙢𝙥𝙡𝙮 𝙒𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙖𝙣 𝙊𝙗𝙟𝙚𝙘𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝘾𝙧𝙖𝙫𝙚 (2009)
𝙄𝙣 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙥, 𝙄𝙣 𝙏𝙞𝙢𝙚 (2025)
𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙇𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩𝙨 𝘾𝙤𝙢𝙚 𝙊𝙣, 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙈𝙪𝙨𝙞𝙘 𝘿𝙞𝙚𝙨 (2006) 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗘𝗱𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀:
Digital print on 170gsm matt offset paper, 29.7 × 42 cm (A3), Ltd Ed of 30 (unsigned) 𝗖𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿’𝘀 𝗘𝗱𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀:
Archival pigment print on Fibre Rag Museum Quality Paper, 29.7 × 42 cm (A3), Ltd Ed of 10 (signed with COA) Both editions are available via @unitlondon . (Fave part of the opening night was seeing how much @nancydurrant enjoyed taking a piece of my work home! - as seen in the last slide)

Off the Record returns this September with a conversation between photographer Bex Wade (@bexwade ) and artist Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley (@ladydangfua ). | Join @artreview_magazine and @ursulamagazine , in partnership with @berrybrosrudd , on Tuesday 2 September at 📍@winebarmayfair . @berrybrosrudd , Britain’s oldest wine and spirit merchant, will welcome each guest with a complimentary glass of wine. Held on the first Tuesday of every month from April to December 2025, these intimate and relaxed conversations bring together artists, thinkers and creatives to give an insight into their inspirations, processes and evolution of ideas.⁠ The series is a celebration of traditional conviviality, designed to be experienced live in a welcoming wine bar setting. 📅 2 Sep, 6.15 pm Welcome Drink | 7.00 pm Talk | 8.00 pm Informal Mingling 📍 @winebarmayfair 🎟️ £14 (Includes a welcome glass of wine + copy of ArtReview & Ursula) 🔗 Learn more at @ursulamagazine ‘s link in bio. 1 Bex Wade. Courtesy the artist 2 Danielle Braithwaite Shirley, I CAN’T FOLLOW YOU ANYMORE, 2024, video game still. Courtesy the artist

“QUEER AS IN FUCK THE POLICE” —————————————————————————————- Internationalist Queer Pride, Berlin, July 26th, 2025 —————————————————————————————- In over two decades of photographing protests and Pride marches around the world, I’ve never seen this level of brutality at a queer demonstration. It felt deliberate. Designed to punish visibility that refused to be palatable. Designed to fracture. But the crowd held its ground. People protected one another, formed circles, linked arms. The organisers made clear: if you stay, you are no longer protected by assembly law. But people stayed. @iqpberlin felt closer to Stonewall than any Pride I’ve attended in 25 years. Not because it was violent, but because it was honest. Raw. Because it insisted that protest is care. That queer lives cannot be separated from the conditions that threaten them. That solidarity is not a slogan, but a practice. That Pride, if it means anything, must mean this: no one is free unless we all are. 6/6

“YOU STARVE THE MOST GENEROUS PEOPLE WHO WOULD HAVE FED YOU WITH THEIR LAST BREATH” —————————————————————————————- Internationalist Queer Pride, Berlin, July 26th, 2025 —————————————————————————————- But violence came early. Police were heavy-handed from the beginning, pushing into crowds, barking orders through speakers, warning that certain slogans and symbols were forbidden. The threat was clear. As the march neared Kottbusser Tor, it erupted. Riot police surged in, tearing a banner from the Palestine bloc, tackling people to the ground. I saw someone dragged by the ankles across the concrete. Some had their arms forced behind their backs, handcuffed or restrained. I saw police cover protesters’ eyes with their hands as they led them away, a gesture as disturbing as it was deliberate. The police were not responding. They were provoking. And they wanted to be seen. 5/6

“D¥KES FOR PALESTINE” —————————————————————————————- Internationalist Queer Pride, Berlin, July 26th, 2025 —————————————————————————————- Another speaker stood with the Palestine bloc and said plainly: “There is no queer pride in a state that funds genocide. There is no freedom if it comes at the expense of others. We are not afraid to name the systems that kill, and we refuse to let our queerness be used to justify occupation.” The mood swelled and shifted throughout the day — rage, grief, elation, exhaustion. Women banging pots, banners in Arabic, in German, in English. There were moments of dancing, and others of complete stillness. All of it was defiant. 4/6

“PUNCH THE TRANSVESTI AND THEY’LL PUNCH YOU BACK” —————————————————————————————- Internationalist Queer Pride, Berlin, July 26th, 2025 —————————————————————————————- The march formed in blocks, each carrying its own history, its own resistance: the P@lestinian bloc, the anti-fascist bloc, the disability justice bloc, the trans bloc, the internationalist bloc, the sex worker bloc, and more. Each had space to speak. One after another, voices filled the air. One was Cleo, a trans woman currently incarcerated in a men’s prison, whose message was read aloud: “As a trans woman held in a men’s prison, I know what it means to be punished for living truthfully. I may be locked away, but my rage, my joy, and my love for this community can’t be caged. You marching today makes me feel freer than any prison break ever could.” 3/6

“ONE GEN0CIDE DOES NOT JUSTIFY ANOTHER —————————————————————————————- Internationalist Queer Pride, Berlin, July 26th, 2025 —————————————————————————————- This year, around 15,000 people gathered under the uncompromising banner: No Pride in Gen0cide. The words carried weight. They refused the pinkwashing of settler colonialism, they exposed the alignment of state violence with rainbow branding, and they cut through the noise. At the heart of the march was a call to end the gen0cide in G@za , where tens of thousands have been killed and starvation is wielded as a weapon of war. Germany’s complicity was made visible in the streets: its arms exports, its political posturing, its criminalisation of solidarity. 2/6