Arts & Entertainment
Spotlight on Anacostia
Ward 8 arts initiative could be ‘transformational’ for neighborhood
Andrea Hope and Tommie Adams look over prints he hopes to have exhibited in the Lumen8Anacostia festival in April. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
With the Smithsonian here and a host of other well-established galleries hosting exhibits — sometimes of national renown — it’s easy to get overlooked in the Washington art scene. But there’s a flourishing art community east of the Anacostia River, a handful of galleries and, come April, a bounty of opportunities for everyone to see them both in the established art houses there and in a bevy of abandoned buildings and warehouses.
Anacostia, just one of the Ward 8 D.C. Southeast neighborhoods east of the River, is changing. On April 14, residents there will launch Lumen8Anacostia, a three-month arts initiative that’s using a $250,000 grant the D.C. Office of Planning received from ArtPlace (a collaboration of nine of the country’s top foundations, eight federal agencies and six large banks that supports “creative placemaking” with grants and more) to be administered to four D.C. neighborhoods (the others are Brookland, Deanwood and the central 14th Street area N.W.) to create temporary art and culture spaces in “emerging” neighborhoods where vacant and/or underutilized storefronts and empty lots will be transformed into art knolls. Arch Development Corporation, which has been working since 1991 to revitalize historic Anacostia with several initiatives and economic development plans, is implementing Lumen8.
Though not an LGBT-specific initiative, one of the organizers, Jeffrey Herrell, is gay and his partner, Tommie Adams, is hoping to have his photography exhibited in one of the spaces. They moved to Anacostia in 2005, delighted at the amount of house and yard they could get for a fraction of the price they would have paid in Washington’s glitzier neighborhoods. Herrell says they love the neighborhood and are delighted to see its cultural side being tapped.
Lumen8 organizers from left are Beth Ferraro, Andrea Hope, Jeffrey Herrell, Nikki Peele and Phil Hutinet. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
“I’m a big ambassador for Anacostia,” Herrell says. “I’m always trying to get my friends to move here and I’ve succeeded a few times. I have great neighbors here. Yes, there have been some ups and downs … but I think [the neighborhood] has been stigmatized. … The neighbors are extremely close, really tight in terms of friendships and the neighborhood kind of brings you together. I really like living here.”
Herrell says he knows two artists who live on his street and has another neighbor who’s an actor/performance artist. His next-door neighbor is also gay, there’s a lesbian couple on his block and another he knows of a couple blocks over. He and Adams say gays in Dupont and Logan would be surprised to discover how easygoing most straight Anacostia residents are with their LGBT neighbors.
“People here really don’t care,” Adams says. “Sometimes the kids will say something at first, but people here don’t really care if there are differences. I guess they have worse issues to deal with.”
Anacostia does, of course, have its problems. About 94 percent black (Ward 7 is 96 percent), Ward 8 residents are plagued with the city’s highest unemployment rate — 35 percent according to the latest figures available from NeighborhoodInfo D.C., a partnership between the Urban Institute and the Washington D.C. Local Initiatives Support Corporation — and 20 violent crimes per 1,000 residents in 2010. Both, sadly, are the highest rates of D.C.’s eight wards (Ward 7’s unemployment rate is 19 percent for those 16 and older; Ward 3 has the lowest with just 3.4 percent of its 16-and-older residents out of work).
But those figures are part of the reason Lumen8 organizers say Anacostia needs some light, quite literally. In addition to the various exhibits planned, organizers plan to illuminate several Anacostia buildings for the festival. A portion of the grant money will go to Intelligent Lighting Company, which will project lights and images on several buildings there.
“We’re lighting it up literally as well as trying to shine an overall spotlight on the neighborhood,” Herrell says.
“So few people really know the location, they think Anacostia is everything east of the river,” says Nikki Peele, an Arch employee who lives in Congress Heights, another Ward 8 neighborhood. “Even lifelong D.C. residents sometimes think that. They’re not sure of the history here, what’s here to do. For too many people, the information they have is that this is a somewhat scary place, so for a project like this, especially on this scale, it has the opportunity to be a transformational moment and not just for the community but for the outside perception of it … it’s very much a family community with an almost village-like feel. … the name was chosen for a reason — to bring both light and understanding.”
Organizers are selecting artists to have their work shown now from a pool of about 20 applicants who heard about the event through neighborhood listserves and word of mouth. After the April 14 kickoff, exhibitors will have to agree to have their gallery spaces open each Saturday and then six hours on another day during the week for the rest of April, May and June. Aside from the neighborhood’s existing three galleries, space such as a former police warehouse and several vacant storefronts on Martin Luther King Avenue and Good Hope Road will be converted into temporary exhibition space. Portions of the funds from the grant will be used to convert the various spaces and to give to the artists to realize their visions for their exhibits.
Herrell says it’s a good opportunity for both D.C. residents in general and also for the Anacostia artists, most amateurs, who’ve never had their work exhibited before.
“They may not be able to afford to open their own store, but this will give them a taste of what it’s like,” he says.
“It’s a very large-scale project,” says Phil Hutinet, Arch’s chief operating officer. “It’s going to be a huge benefit to the artistic community and to the neighborhood.”
Sports
Trans cyclist’s victory sparks outrage in conservative media
Katheryn Phillips is originally from DC
On the heels of UPenn erasing the record of the first openly transgender NCAA Division I All-American swimmer and the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to tackle bans on trans student-athletes, right wing media is now all hot and bothered about the latest trans woman who won a cycling championship — even though she competed according to the rules.
On Tuesday, 58-year-old Katheryn Phillips finished first in USA Cycling’s Lyons Masters National Championship race for women aged 55-59, with a time of 1:42:10, according to the official results posted by the organization. The record shows her gender as “F” for female.
One second behind Phillips was Julie Peterson, with a time of 1:42:11 — as were three other cyclists: Mary Beth Grier, Andrea Cherniak-Tyson, and Carolyn Maddox.
Peterson, 57, was so outraged, she told Fox News she refused to stand on the podium in second place next to Phillips. Her story was swiftly shared by the New York Post (also owned by Fox’s parent company News Corp.), the Daily Mail, Breitbart, and other conservative media.
Both Peterson and another competitor are accusing USA Cycling of “hiding” that a transgender woman had registered to race.
“It was hidden from us. Katheryn Phillips, KJ’s name, was not on that list. And I checked it up all the way to the point of closure when we couldn’t register online anymore,” Debbie Milne told Fox.
“If I had known, I wouldn’t have spent thousands of dollars in travel and time off work to come and do a race,” Peterson said. Fox welcomed Milne, 56, who finished seventh on Tuesday, to Fox & Friends Thursday morning.
(Video courtesy of Fox News)
Peterson told Fox she did complain to USA Cycling officials prior to the race. Both Milne and Peterson referred to Phillips as a male, and with “he/him” pronouns.
“To be fair to all humans, if we want to say ‘him’ or ‘her,’ he was born a biological male, that is a fact,” Milne said. “And that is the thing that makes it an unfair advantage. Whatever has happened after that is a whole different topic.”
“I said, ‘I don’t want to race against a man,’ and they quickly scolded me and said ‘Oh, you can’t call him a man,’ and I’m like ‘Well, he is a man,’ so I was quickly scolded and corrected that it is a woman and I don’t even know what to say.”
USA Cycling did not respond to the Washington Blade’s emails requesting comment.
Phillips, who goes by Kate and by “KJ,” is a former rugby player with the D.C. Furries, who stated in the comments of a 2024 article published by Zwift Insider that she was the first out trans athlete in the U.S. to compete under the 2004 International Olympic Committee’s guidelines on trans participation.
“When USA Rugby told me about the IOC decision in 2004, I raised my hand to be included. I experience nothing but joy when I play, ride, and race,” Phillips said.
As the Blade has reported, the International Olympic Committee drastically revised those rules in 2021, and in March, Republican lawmakers in D.C. demanded the IOC ban trans female athletes from women’s sporting events altogether.
The Blade also reached out to Phillips for comment but as of press time we have not received a response. She told Zwift Insider in March 2024 she does not let those who disapprove or spread hate impact her performance or her attitude.
“I am unaffected by dissent. I love, I share joy, I am me, and I have been my authentic self for decades,” she said. It’s been reported Phillips came out in 1999, and told Zwift Insider she considers herself a lifelong cyclist.
“I’ve been on a bike for as long as I can remember,” said Phillips. “As kids, my friends and I rode all over town, we were feral kids; no cell phones, no trackers … we just roamed, and nobody got in trouble or hurt bad enough not to ride home … Scrapes/bruises/cuts were not an issue for us. In my teens, I worked for myself as a court/legal messenger, doing all of the work via my bike until I got a car. Raced BMX as a kiddo (when I mowed lawns to cover the race entry fees), I did MTB stuff (non-racing) and Sprint/Olympic Triathlons in my 30’s, and now I’m racing on Zwift, Road/Gravel, and CX in my 50s.”
In the comments section, Phillips made clear she’s not competing to win.
“I don’t do sports for victory, I do it because like many other women, I am an athlete to my core,” she said. “Unlike some, I am not there to WIN, I am there to do my best with the competitors and teammates I have around me trying to do the same…we are in it for the experience. I rejoice in their wins, and a lot of joy is reflected back to me when I have a good day.”
Celebrity News
Nina West’s ‘Sugar in the Tank’ tour comes to Rehoboth Beach
Drag Race’ contestant will be at Clear Space Theater Company on July 6
Nina West, a drag queen known for competing on “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” is currently on her ‘Sugar in the Tank’ tour around U.S. cities.
With previous shows in Key West, Fla., New York, and hometown of Columbus, Ohio, the tour is staying put in Provincetown, Mass., from late July to early September. It will make a stop at Clear Space Theater Company in Rehoboth Beach, Del., as part of a summer cabaret series on July 6.
Andrew Levitt has been performing as Nina West for 25 years, who got her rise from starring in “Drag Race” Season 11, where she placed sixth and won Miss Congeniality, a title awarded to the contestant who is regarded as the kindest and most helpful one of that season.
West has toured “Hairspray” on Broadway as Edna Turnblad, starred in a couple of feature films and published a children’s book titled ‘The You Kind of Kind.’
Levitt said he wrote this show in response to attacks from the government towards the LGBTQ community.
“‘Sugar in the Tank’ is a big old gay fabulous summer musical,” Levitt told the Washington Blade. “The show is a response to the darkness that I think has fallen over a lot of people in the country and it’s hopefully trying to bring a little bit of light and a little bit of joy.”
“Sugar in the Tank” is a Southern euphemism for gay, often holding a negative connotation. Levitt said he wanted to “reclaim and embrace” queerness in times when some people want to take that away.
Levitt said he knew he would be traveling to predominantly queer destinations like Key West and Provincetown for these shows and that was always at the forefront of his mind when writing “Sugar in the Tank.”
This will be Levitt’s first time in Rehoboth Beach. Clear Space Theater is considered Delaware’s second-largest professional non-profit theater and the state’s most prolific producer of professional theater. The space seats just 170 patrons and Levitt said he loves the intimacy of a small venue and that it’s his favorite way to do a show.
“Stages like this size are the perfect size for me because it allows for me to really showcase my talents,” Levitt said.
Levitt founded the Nina West Foundation in 2015 to uplift and sustain the central Ohio LGBTQ community, which has raised more than $3 million for various organizations. He said he makes activism part of the entertainment in his career.
“That’s the nuance of what drag is. We can be ridiculous for fun and we can be serious but it’s all wrapped up into one thing,” Levitt said. “I think that can be the power of it.”
Levitt said West is so much more confident now than when he first started performing as her. He didn’t know where his voice belonged in the community in the past, but because of those who came before him in this art form, he has learned to harness the power of the stage and the power of the wig to be able to tell stories.
“I really love my community. I love queer people. I love who we are and what we represent,” Levitt said. “Knowing our history and knowing that we’ve been through a lot, I’m really thrilled that as a queen, I can use my voice and my platform to help try to better our community, not try to speak for everyone but try to lend voice to people who desperately need it.”
Levitt’s advice to young queer artists is to not give up on yourself, surround yourself with supportive people and allow yourself the opportunity and space to fail, to ask questions, and to not give up.
“Our young people have got to be told they matter,” Levitt said. “Oftentimes, people are told that they don’t matter, that their voice doesn’t matter, that they cannot make a difference and I want to remind every single person who’s doing this that they do matter, they can make a difference, their voice is intrinsic to who we are as a community.”
If Sugar in the Tank was a drink, it would be a Bahama Mama or Sex on the Beach, said Levitt, because they are delicious, juicy, and sugary, just like the show.
“I just want everyone to know that they should come to ‘Sugar in the Tank’ and experience a show that’s built on joy and levity and silliness and fun and come have some fun with me and show me the fabulous love of Rehoboth Beach,” Levitt said. “I can’t wait.”
The Rainbow History Project will host “Pickets, Protests and Parade Exhibit Tour” at 7 p.m. at Freedom Plaza. This event honors the courage, resilience and resistance of D.C.’s gay community. For more details, visit Eventbrite.
Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ Community Social” at 7 p.m. at Hyatt Centric Arlington (1325 Wilson Blvd.). This fun event is ideal for meeting new people and community building. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Xavier Entertainment DC will host “Cowboy Carter Afterparty” at 10 p.m. at Nellie’s Sports Bar. There will be fireworks, parades, and patriotic fun. For more details, visit Eventbrite.
Mezcal Amaras will host “Sha Boing Boing Showdown” at 6 p.m. at Snappy’s Small Bar (3917 Georgia Ave., N.W.). Get ready to test your hotdog eating abilities. Tickets start at $12.51 and can be purchased on Eventbrite.
Illusions Drag Queen Show will host “Drag Queen Dinner Show” at 7 p.m. at 2323 18th St. N.W. Guests will be treated to the very best celebrity drag impersonations in entertainment. Tickets start at $12.97 and are available on Eventbrite.
Thurst Lounge will host “A Thirsty Cowboy Afterparty” at 5 p.m. DJ Apollo will be performing. For more details, visit Thurst’s website.
9:30 Club will host “Gimme Gimme Disco: A Dance Party Inspired by ABBA” at 9 p.m. The DJ will play plenty of disco hits from the 70s and 80s. Tickets cost $45.30 and can be purchased on Ticketmaster.
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Nina West’s ‘Sugar in the Tank’ tour comes to Rehoboth Beach
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Upwards of 100K people march in Budapest Pride
Supreme Court to consider bans on trans athletes in school sports
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