Today we’re taking our entire program to discuss an art show that touches on so many themes relevant to the Mission District—music, Chicano culture, queer identity, and, of course, low riders. Starting this week, Galeria de la Raza will be showing Q-Sides a photo exhibit that recreates album covers of the classic soul and dowop anthologies East-Side Stories.
First released in 1987, the East Side Story collections consisted of twelve volumes of classic oldies dedicated to and inspired by the lowrider and homeboy culture of LA’s Eastside. Each LP had an iconic cover image of lowriders and the people who rode them. In Q-Sides, collaborators Vero Majano, DJ Brown Amy, and Kari Orvik recreated these album cover photos using models from San Francisco’s LGBTQ community. The result is a playful and stylish set of images that evokes nostalgia for mid-century lowrider culture while simultaneously subverting it. It also richly captures a kind of family portrait for San Francisco’s existing queer Latino community.