OPEN CALL CLOSING SOON: Enter by 14th December

Issue 02 Online Gallery

Welcome to the Issue 02 Online Gallery, where you can find a preview of our Featured Artist’s work and links to their websites and/or social media platforms so you can easily find your way back to the artists themselves.
For writers, check out our Online Library.

Renato Pino

He/Him

My art is a celebration of queerness, fluidity, and the beauty of breaking free from labels. Through my oil paintings, digital illustrations, and mixed media works, I aim to challenge traditional norms and explore the vast spectrum of human identity and expression. Using bold brush strokes, vibrant colors, and vivid shapes, I create art that defies easy categorization. I am not constrained by realism or hyperrealism but instead focus on conveying a message and capturing the essence of my subjects with a sense of freedom and fluidity. As a queer artist myself, I am passionate about representing the LGBTQI+ community and other marginalized groups that are often underrepresented in the art world. I seek to normalize, dignify, and elevate the diverse experiences and beauty of being queer, free, and unapologetically oneself.

IG: @renatopino.art Web: renato-pino.square.site

AR Quinlan

They/She

AR’s art focuses on the joys found in the natural, with their work often focusing on growing, living things, and their life cycles. She loves both flora and fauna, living and dead, and often takes inspiration from her surroundings for pieces. They have recently begun the process of learning to create art digitally to make sharing easier. “Birds and botanicals, baby!” is what they’d say if they were asked to describe their work in an artist statement.

IG: @strawberry_frog_art

India Clarke

She/Her

India Clarke is a first year Fine Art student based in Liverpool, her work centres themes of fantasy and surrealism, nature, and queer women's experiences. The Pre Raphaelites, along with romantic poetry and fairy tales, inspire her practice, and she sometimes likes to write poems of her own.

IG: @artistintheforest

Hammy

She/Her

Hammy is a Queer self-taught artist based in London who embraces the spirit of self-discovery. Her art is a visual exploration of identity, culture, and the significance found in the rich memories of her mixed heritage. Without formal qualifications, Hammy has embraced the challenges of being a self-taught artist, turning each obstacle into an opportunity for growth. Her artistic journey is a testament to the idea that creativity knows no bounds and that true artistry is often cultivated through passion and dedication. Hammy consistently explores her identity and the beauty associated with it.

IG: @hammyislostagain

Lauren Shakespeare

They/Them

My practice as a painter focuses on portraiture to explore my experiences as a lesbian in goth, punk and metal subculture spaces. Compositions from religious and genre paintings form a basis for my works and create a play on the traditional hierarchy of genres, introducing ideas of the messy experiences of a night out to an art form seen as high class. The music and aesthetics of queercore punk and goth also come through in how I display my work, rejecting the white cube for the aesthetics of a club bathroom.

IG: @L.shakespeare.art

Hannah

She/He

I am Hannah, a mixed media artist from Milton Keynes. I never think or know what I am going to make before I start doing it, I'm usually clueless to any end result. Automatically I tend to combine things from my mundane; whether simple or strange. Disjointedness of concept I think is what makes art, my art.

IG: @pixel_.h

Sega

He/Him

Sega is a self-taught transmasc artist. His practice began when he first discovered trans community through tattooing, and has since extended to paint and digital art. His work centres on the concept of hope, possibilities and love as a trans person. His time is split between tattooing at Fort, a trans-run art studio & community space, working in a queer creative health charity, and his expanding art practice.

IG: @segadoeslines

Philip Rainey

He/Him

Philip Rainey is a queer visual artist based in Northern Ireland. Their practice incorporates lens-based art alongside text, exploring themes of selfhood, spirituality and memory. Through a lyrical visual style which blurs the lines between the pictorial and the painterly, their work uses the camera as an equilibrium between the real and the fictitious. Experimenting with materiality and tactility, they are interested in how photography can be encountered as a spatial and sensory experience. Through photography, video and installation, their work stems from the poetics of the everyday.

IG: @philip_rainey Web: www.philip-rainey.com

Star Gaze

They/Them

Two figures face each other but do not touch- the potential connection between them is present but ultimately unfulfilled. What does it mean to connect with other people? And how can we connect despite our differences? My art practice examines the disconnect between the polarised sides of the ‘trans debate’ and whether it is possible to circumvent this division. I am interested in the mother-child dynamic as a metaphor for the relationship that transgender individuals have with their ‘mother’ society.

IG: @stargazeartist Web: linktr.ee/stargazeartist

Jay McAvoy

They/Them

Jay McAvoy is a multimedia artist and animator based in Manchester. Inspired by the sights, sounds and movements of nature, their work captures the beauty of the natural world in an abstract, expressive way.

Click Here (or on the image to the right) to view the full piece

IG: @yellojam

Silvestre Correia
& George Murphy

He/Him & He/Him

Silvestre Correia From Coimbra, Portugal, and based in Sheffield, UK, Silvestre is a transgender performer and theatre and film director whose work comes from thoughts that are united into something that goes beyond definition. It’s about exposing something disturbing yet playful, that cannot be fully explained.George Murphy From Congleton, UK, and based in Sheffield, UK, George is a writer whose work allows a glimpse into a macabre reality where stories unfold, appalling to some, alluring to others.They have partnered into filmmaking in an attempt to create art that can repulse as well as amaze, art that generates doubt.

IG: @deadat5ft1 & @ thefilthiestpersonalive
Web: www.silvestrecorreia.com

Daphnellc

They/Them

Daphnellc is an experimental techno producer, sound & video artist, sound editor, fine artist and poet in the Midlands, UK. They are driven by experimental processes in electronic music and art. Their live performances utilise two drum machines as the main force of generative techno for dancing.As a multidisciplinary artist, they create with varied resources; field recordings, drum & melodic programming, digital and paper drawings, lines from self-healing poems. They are heavily influenced by acid house and the rave scene, DIY movements in art and queer community.

IG: @daphnellc16 Web: www.larrycrywater.wordpress.com

Issue 01 Online Gallery

Here you will find all the amazing artists featured in Issue 01 of CV&L, with a preview of their work and links to their websites and/or social media platforms so you can easily find your way back to the artists themselves.
For writers, check out our Online Library.

Alice Robb

She/They

Alice Robb is a queer artist based in Reading. Their art aims to capture the innate impermanence of liminal spaces through a variety of mediums - namely installation, live theatre, and collage. Robb explores the curiousness of the uncanny through a careful combination of textures and themes to create works that are both distantly familiar and empathetically othered.

alicerobb34.wixsite.com/alice-robb
@alice_robb on Instagram

Jack Neal

He/Him

Jack Neal is an illustrator working in south Yorkshire. His work draws inspiration from his experience growing up autistic and transgender. Through his work, he conveys queer experiences in a warm environment, exploring the bright and passionate love between trans people. Jack strives to create a safe space for queer folk to exist in and embrace their own identities.

@half.ant on Instagram

Izzy Osborn

They/Them

Izzy Osborn is a multidisciplinary post conceptual artist. Their practice aims to explore individual’s relationship with contemporary art and ‘the institution’. This exploration has taken place through a series of co-creational projects organised under the artists pseudonym, library of ideas. These projects are installed within an environment such as an art college or gallery space, and playfully engage with the environment’s population. Concepts such as knowledge creation or the relationship between art and design are explored through the vehicles of questionnaires, worksheets and forms. The responses gathered from individuals, are in turn presented back to the community, through exhibitons of prints, videos and zines.

izzyosborn.vsble.me
@library.of.ideas on Instagram

Amy Lloyd

She/They/He

Amy is a queer, disabled artist who specialises in pencil drawings and the occasional oil painting. A lot of her work is inspired by special interests (like dinosaurs and anatomy) but typically Amy attempts to stretch the limits of detail in her work and exploit her experience of perfectionism through drawing. Amy studies Psychology with Neuroscience BSc but her passion seems to always come back to the arts, dedicating any spare time to a tonal drawing session.

amylloyd0.wixsite.com/amysophia
@amylloyd.art on Instagram

Sid Barker

She/They

Sid is an autistic queer artist from London. Throughout their life, they remained very isolated and lonely. They did not fit in with their peers, societal norms were confusing and their home life was stressful. They express this through their art.
Growing up, comics and graphic novels kept them company. Archie comics, The Moomins and Calvin and Hobbes all play inspiration in the work they create today.

sidbarker.my.canva.site
@sidgravy on Instagram

Olive C. Payne

She/Her

Olive Payne is a non-binary filmmaker and photographer based in Liverpool. Originally from Scarborough, N. Yorkshire, their work utilises landscape in order to express people’s relationship to their surroundings.

@mrs_parrot on Instagram

Amber Winter

She/Her

I have lived multiple lives. Once I was a young boy who was unaware of his abnormalities; once I was a twink who thirsted for the acceptance of experienced men; once I was a crossdresser hiding behind my own fear. I am a chameleon, adapting and reacting. I break myself down and build myself back up again. I seize my mind, my flesh, and my soul and carve, break, snap, pull, and stitch them into my own shape. I am Amber Winter, and I am an artist of the traditional sense as well as an artist of my own biology.

@amberwinterartist on Instagram

Matt David

They/Them

Matt David is a London-based, Scottish queer artist. They received a BA in Illustration from Duncan of Jordanstone School of Arts and Design University of Dundee in 2014. Their work developed from primarily pastel and ink portrait and figure work to exploring the cyanotypes and combining mediums with this technique.

Matt’s work centres on exploring queerness within symbolism, sexuality and expression. It has been essential for Matt to create work that tackles themes they surround themselves with and challenge. This ranges from HIV stigma to objectification of queer bodies.

www.mattdavid.co.uk
@mattdavidartist on Instagram

Rachel Kavanagh

She/Her

Using the mediums of sculpture, lens, illustration and installation, I aim to capture the bodily discomfort and dissociation queer people experience. I contrast hard and soft materials to evoke and contrast the “real” and “symbolic” body. In a world which adheres to heteronormative ideas about gender and the body, feeling disconnected from our physical beings allows for escape into fantasy. Exploring the queer body through imagination allows for a catharsis which permits acceptance and freedom, without physical limitations and a disregard for how the body should appear.

@rachlkaart on Instagram

Sieve Bonaiuti

They/Them

Sieve’s work is mainly inspired by intimacy, queerness, folktales and magic. In their illustrations and poetry, these elements are mixed together, while showing snapshots of ordinary life.

@mohnwald on Instagram

Joe Hull

They/Them

Joe Hull is a multimedia artist with a focus on sculpture and painting. They are non-binary and create work that is reflective of their experience of gender and sexuality, which reflects feelings of devotion, feeling trapped in one’s body and otherness through kink and BDSM aesthetics. They also hope to de-stigmatise BDSM through their work and show how it can be a powerful way of reclaiming autonomy.

@joehull_art on Instagram

Rein Lee

They/Them

Rein is a young queer artist that is studying illustration and animation at Kingston University. They work in a variety of disciplines, most notably in zines, digital and traditional illustrations and animation. During their short time in being a practicing artist, they have animated and illustrated for book covers, posters, animated adverts and moving image work for documentaries. All of their works focus on portraying the mood of bitter sweetness, the melancholy and sad nostalgia that is silently present in our lives. Recording both the surreal and the mundane, their works forces us to familiarise ourselves to fictional places, characters and scenarios.

Tidal Wave is avaialble for purchase in Rein’s etsy shop.

@Rein__lee on Instagram
@Reinlee55 on X (Twitter)

ShonaMary

She/Her

ShonaMary is a digital artist from the North West of England specialising in Gothic fantasy characters. Heavily inspired by table top role playing games as well as myths, legends and cryptids. Her art strives to show both the fierce and whimsical side of the female characters she creates.

linktr.ee/ShonaMaryDesigns
@shonamary_designs on Instagram

Chloe Crxxs

She/Her

Chloe is an 18 year old artist who recently moved to Manchester, and spends most of her time creating illustrations or simple sketches of her own original characters. As a lesbian, she paints mainly about queerness and the relationships that queer people experience, whether that be platonic, romantic, or otherwise. Her favourite mediums include gouache and ink pens, but she’s not shy of experimenting with multimedia pieces or stepping out of her comfort zone. Chloe’s main inspirations stem from different places, such as fashion, nature, her own queer experience, and the experiences of those around her.

@chloecrxxs_draw on Instagram

Sylvie (Sage) McAlpine-Lee

They/Them

I’m Sage ( Sylvie) I’m a queer, nonbinary artist, writer, poet and musician based in Edinburgh. I’m currently accepting commissions and can be contacted via my email, sylviemcalpinelee@icloud.com

My work takes inspiration from high contrast, visual striking , graphic and street art. It is often based around sketches I complete on paper before transferring to my digital medium. I discuss and display themes or religion, pain, isolation, perception and many others in a striking manner.

@the_things_i_can_make on Instagram

Martyna Meramow

She/Her

Martyna is a Fashion/Event photographer, Her work (mainly focused on fashion) tends to link to her likes and upbringing in hopes to relate to her target audience. Her current style revolves around coloured gels which she finds bring life to her photographs, as well as editorial which she is also passionate about this can be seen both in her photographs and in her day to day personal editorial work. At times she likes to challenge herself to styles of photography such as street photography which she feels is a good way to build up her photographic skills.

mbmphotography.uk
@_martynas.photography_ on Instagram

Sarah Gant

She/Her

Based in both Bournemouth and Leeds, photographer and filmmaker Sarah Gant takes inspiration from the natural world around her. Her work looks at how people interact with the spaces they live in and the beauty that surrounds them. Artists such as Joe Greer, Sophie Jones and Lauren Questell also show these themes throughout their visuals and have inspired Sarah within her practice.

sarahlizgant.wixsite.com/sarahgant
@sarahlizg on Instagram

Rea Fortis

She/Her

Producer and audiovisual specialist, Rea Fortis, has been fascinated with music videos as a child and even more recently the phenomena of visual albums. A musician at heart, Fortis is a genre chameleon that is not bound to her love of house, Latin and blues music, but combines the most enchanting aspects of these genres to create her music with. She composes music with ivory keys at her fingertips and assortment of saxes at the ready. This year, Rea Fortis has broken boundaries through releasing her debut EP in the form of a visual album.

@reafortis on Instagram

Frankie Marshall

They/Them

Frankie is a queer mixed-media artist from Leeds who recently moved to London for university. Their practice is focused primarily on the process rather than the final piece. In their work they use a variety of different materials and processes ranging from 3D pieces, video, performance and 2D works. The aim of their work is to blur the lines between these different categories and create work that can engage with a variety of people. Frankie’s work often has a focus on the relationship between humans and their environment in an abstract or surrealist way using overwhelming texture, colour and pattern.

frankiewoozleart.myportfolio.com
@frankie_artsxd on Instagram

Andrew Hannaford

He/Him

Exploring lived reality and issues experienced by trans and queer communities is the focus of Andrew Hannaford’s work. He investigates the parts of being queer and trans that aren’t typically acknowledged or visible within mainstream society, inspired by his own personal experience with gender. All created with the aim of sparking discussions about the trans experience and dismantling the constrictive narratives that are too frequently written for trans people. Having been highly influenced by the artist Cassils, he investigates this through interdisciplinary practice, typically integrating some aspect of performance.

@3ye.evil on Instagram

AMILLS

She/They

AMILLS is a 21 year old artist/producer from SE London. With a rock background, her production style merges alternative and indie rock sounds with pop and trap. Proud member of the LGBTQ+ Community, AMILLS hopes to be a strong female voice with experimental production style from rock influences such as Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails, fused with elements of rap such as Lund and Nothing Nowhere. ‘For A Week Or Two’ released (16/06) followed by ‘I’m Not This’ (25/08) marks the new direction AMILLS is moving with the project, both of which have been played by BBC introducing.

amills.fanlink.to/amills
@amillsdisconnected on Instagram

KaiKaydee

They/Them

I create music I have dubbed ‘cynical pop’, which combines emotional lyrics, with upbeat music with elements/inspiration drawn from many genres. I believe music can be a positive tool to help us communicate when struggling with our mental health, and aim to help others feel more comfortable discussing their struggles.

linktr.ee/KaiKaydee
@kaikaydee on Instagram