Celebcity: Brighton Pride Arts and Film Festival
The Golden Handbag Awards, Jess Albarn’s solo art show & Brighton Pride Arts and Film Festival
Fox and Sarah Savage, stars of C4 documentary My Transsexual Summer, accept the award in best trans* category for Trans*Pride
Golden glamour
Sunday night saw the JBPR team getting all glammed up to attend The Golden Handbag Awards at the Hilton Brighton Metropole. Acknowledged as Brighton’s Gay Oscars, the awards were created in 1995 by GScene magazine to acknowledge everything that is positive and fabulous about the Brighton commercial gay scene and to highlight the work delivered by LGBT and HIV voluntary sector organisations in the city.
Since their inception, the awards have raised more than £175,000 for local organisations – a truly incredible achievement. A total of 22 awards were handed out on the night – all voted for by GScene readers. The evening was compered by the brilliant Lola Lasagne and the dazzling crowd of beautiful people assembled in the audience were treated to performances from Britain’s Got Talent semi-finalist Eva Iglesias.
GScene editor and the man behind the awards, James Ledward, comments: “The Golden Handbag Awards give all sectors of the LGBT community – including entertainers, businesses and voluntary sector organisations – the opportunity to come together in the same room once a year, congratulate each other and say ‘job well done’.
“GScene readers take the voting very seriously and it was satisfying this year that more people than ever entered into the true spirit of the event, while raising money for the new LGBT Community Groups Network.”
Keeping it in the family
Regular readers of the column will know that we recently worked with the lovely Jessica Albarn on her solo art show Resurrection at the Lawrence Alkin Gallery in London, the sister gallery of Brighton’s Art Republic. There was much excitement at the gallery last week when Jess’s brother, Damon, turned up to have a look at what his sister had been up to. Damon, who you might have heard of from his turn in Brit-pop behemoths Blur, was a proper gent, posing for pictures and being jolly nice to all involved. Check out Jess’s work and get more information here: www.lawrencealkingallery.com/artists/jessica-albarn
A programme to be proud of
Next month sees the start of the second annual Brighton Pride Arts and Film Festival (BPAFF). With a full programme of events, BPAFF is a celebration of each and every aspect of the city’s vibrant artist community from the arts to dance, from performance to film.
The first event in this year’s festival is the Freedom To Live art exhibition which opens on 18 July at the Jubilee Library.
Nick Cave, Brighton resident and frontman of the Bad Seeds, has very generously donated a gorgeous limited edition signed poster to be included within this exhibition, before being auctioned to raise money for The Rainbow Fund, the independent body that distributes all funds raised by Pride events.
The poster, pictured here, has been designed by American artist Chuck Sperry, one of the foremost rock poster artists and printmakers. For more information on BPAFF check out www.brighton-pride.org/arts_festival.php
Jo Brooks is director of Brighton-based PR company JBPR Ltd, 01273 622555, www.jb-pr.com
Send celebrity spots, gossip and pictures to job@jb-pr.com
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