Walking Tour: Queer Artist/Activists of the Lower East Side, 1960-2000
Organized by Close Friends Collective with Henry Street Settlement
Join us as we spend the 2026 season remixing our walking tours of the Lower East Side and the East Village! On our first tour offering this season, we will look at many influential queer artist/activists of the late 20th century on the Lower East Side – including Martin Wong, Miguel Piñero, Jack Smith, Mario Montez, Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, and the Gran Fury collective.
These artist/activists were deeply connected to the Lower East Side, and their work stands on the sometimes uneasy, sometimes joyful intersection of artistic creativity and political action. On our tour, we’ll discuss questions that these luminaries’ lives and works provoke: Is art made by queer artists always political? Would we even want it to be? Who is the audience for queer art?
The tour will begin at Henry Street Settlement’s Abrons Arts Center, 466 Grand Street, a community arts space with a 110-year history of art and activism.
Tours are led by the Close Friends Collective, a group of educators, historians, and artists with a passion for teaching queer history. Since 2021, Close Friends Collective has led queer history walking tours of the Lower East Side and the East Village in partnership with Henry Street Settlement. Closer Friends Collective members are: Natalie Hill, Salonee Bhaman, Daniel Walber, erin reid, Jimmy Fay, and Katie Vogel.
Tours are available only to the first 20 registrants. Tickets are $20 each. Five free tickets are available for each tour on a first-come, first-served basis. If the date and time you’re looking for are not showing up as a ticket option, this means all tickets have been claimed. If you cannot add multiple tickets, that means we have fewer tickets available than you would like to purchase.
Pay it forward! If you’d like to pay more than the $20 ticket amount, your donation will be used to subsidize free tickets and support Henry Street’s history programming.
For updates and announcements about Queer History Walking Tours, be sure to follow Henry Street Settlement on social media or sign up for our monthly e-newsletter.
If you are interested in booking a private tour, please contact Info@HenryStreet.org.