Queerdistan

Queerdistan is a photo / story project by Kurdish artist Ciwan Veysel living in Vienna, that focuses on the systematic racist, homophobic, transphobic and discriminatory experiences of Kurdish LGBTQIA+ individuals who were born in Austria or migrated to Austria and tries to make these struggles visible.

The project targets Kurdish LGBTQIA+ individuals and enables them to address issues such as attitudes towards immigrants, integration issues, and visibility of their identity through the artistic practices of photography and storytelling. Kurdish LGBTQIA+ individuals living in Austria were severely affected by the pandemic. Queerdistan shows what it means for them to live as Kurdish LGBTQIA+ persons in the Austrian society, how they develop methods to cope with these problems and talk about how they want to shape their own future in Austria.

Queerdistan represents on one hand the connection of the artist Ciwan Veysel, who lives in Austria, with his own identity and on the other hand wants to focus on the queer Kurdish community.