Brad Shreve: 0:00

This is Queer we Are. When your medium is audio, it's a bit tricky to bring on a guest whose art is visual. I mean, what do I do with a guest who is an outstanding photographer like B Proud? Ask you, the listener, to email me your address so I can snail mail you her portfolio? Of course, that's ridiculous, but you'll find, while listening to our conversation is also unnecessary. You'll hear enough about B's photos that you'll want to see them for yourselves, but what's important is the why she took on these projects she has and that message is loud and clear in her interview, with no visual aids necessary.

Brad Shreve: 0:45

Here on Queer we Are, I have conversations with LGBTQ people sharing positive stories within our community. You know that thing that's been in the headlines, or that bullshit that's been going on in that one state, and then there's that thing that those people are doing. You won't hear that here, or at least not much of it. For a brief period, I cut through the noisy headlines bombarding us every day, focusing on the good news that isn't shared enough, and give your brain a break, if only for a few minutes. So what are B's projects? Well, in 2014, she published a magnificent book of her photos with LGBTQ couples with a story about them. She is currently tourning exhibit that will eventually make it to a book of its own. This time around, her photos are of transgender couples, and the photos are nothing short of breathtaking, and one interesting difference between the two projects is she had a specific reason to use only black and white photos in the 2014 broader LGBT community couples book, yet on the current project with transgender couples, she found it important that they be in color. Why the difference? Listen and you'll find out.

Brad Shreve: 1:57

And the good news is you don't have to wait long to hear it, because I am Brad Shreve and my guest is B Proud and Queer. We Are Barbara Proud. There is an old saying I don't know art, but I know what I like. Now that's typically attributed to Walt Disney and, I think, orson Welles, but its origin is likely much older than that era. Regardless, I think it's something I think many people can relate to and, that said, I've been looking over many, many of your photographs and I can confidently say I have been viewing art. Well, thank you. Well, thank you. It's beautiful. Now your name is Barbara Proud, but you go by B Proud and you have every reason to be proud based on what, everything I've seen and work that you're doing.

B Proud: 2:56

Thanks. I was pretty lucky to be born with that name and now I just have to live up to it.

Brad Shreve: 3:02

Well, I was going to say, is it difficult to live up to it?

B Proud: 3:06

I'm working on it.

Brad Shreve: 3:07

It keeps down your toes. I'm sure I'm working on it. It's very fortuitous. Do you keep it in your mind when you do things? Absolutely Wonderful, I think I'd be, from this point forward. Okay, we're going to discuss the Transunding Love Project that you're currently working on, but first I've got to ask you more of a mainstream question, because President Obama and Lady Gaga you photographed them on the same day, which is quite an honor. You showed us how respected your work is. What is the story behind that?

B Proud: 3:37

Well, actually I've photographed for the Human Rights Campaign for decades and numerous capacities from still life, commercial stuff, retail things to their national dinners and some of the regional dinners. So I photographed the national dinners.

Brad Shreve: 3:52

And the Girl Scouts and the Girl Scouts. I like to say them because I love the Girl Scouts.

B Proud: 3:58

And so they were both scheduled to be at a Human Rights Campaign national dinner together Actually one event, but they were both there. And then Lady Gaga there was a march the next day, and she was also a speaker at the march, so I got to make some more photographs of her.

Brad Shreve: 4:13

So you and they were all at the right place at the right time, exactly the right threesome, exactly Along with 3,000 other people. A great trifecta. I want to get in depth about the Transcending Love Project in a bit. I want to talk about the genesis, but before we get to that, just give us a brief description of what the Transcending Love Project is before we get into it deeper later.

B Proud: 4:35

I like to call it a celebration of transgender and gender nonconforming couples and families across the country, and it's just a way for me to try to offer to the world the humanistic side of a community that has been thrown under the bus forever, to try to make a very palatable, easily digestible vision of people that are normally in many people's minds. A trans person is a man in a dress and that's as far as it goes. So people don't know that they've even met a trans person, and they may very well have, they may very well work next to one, but they have a vision in their mind and, with all the hatred and bigotry going on right now against that community, I think that showing the beauty and the full humanity of this community is really important.

Brad Shreve: 5:23

I will say work like yours is very important and I have a family member, deep religious, and whenever a trans person would come on television you can tell that's a man in a way and things like that, and had a long discussion with her several times about some individuals are able to have a more feminine look and therefore you would look at them and wouldn't say that and others don't have that type of build and it doesn't change the fact that they are a woman or they are a man, you know whichever. And it took a while, but she gets it now. Oh great, she not only gets it, she respects it. Good for you. People do change, no matter how much people want to think, people do change.

B Proud: 5:58

Well, in order to change, we have to have the conversations, and that's what my work is about, too, is having those conversations.

Brad Shreve: 6:06

Exactly, I said I wanted to go back to the Genesis and that's why I want to talk about your portraits of enduring LGBTQ relationships. That's the prequel to transcending love and that was published back in 2014. And it's not lost on me that that was a year before the Supreme Court Obergefell versus Hodges. Right, and forgive me if I get that wrong, but basically marriage equality became the law of the land. What was the impetus to do that?

B Proud: 6:32

It was kind of a culmination of things, or I say a domino effect of many things that just coincided at the same time, beginning with the month before President Obama's election. In October, my then partner, now wife, and I celebrated our 20th anniversary and on that day we became the longest surviving couple in our families. So they're in my family. A few had passed away so had separated it till death to his part, but in others were all on their second, third and fourth tries at marriage. But they had all the rights. They had 1,148 more rights than we did instantly. Yeah, we were the picture of stability and we were accepted by our families for sure. We were the pets-itters, we're the godparents to all the nieces and nephews, we were the elder care, we were powers of attorney, we were executors of wills. We were even executors of the exes wills. So we're just the stable couple, yet we don't get the rights. And that was really wearing on me. And then President Obama was elected.

B Proud: 7:33

At the same time, Proposition A8 passed in California, as well as a few other hateful measures in Arkansas and other states, and it just, for me, was the tip of the iceberg, the straw that broke the camel's back. Whatever it is I just I had enough, and at the same time, we also had a great economic decline and I lost a lot of work. So I decided I would make my own work and that I would do something completely different from what I had been doing. I had my commercial work, but I also photographed personally in a very different way, and I decided that when I teach my students, I tell them that their art is their voice. And I decided that I had to walk the walk and that I would try to use my photography to make a difference and to show a different way of looking at a community that, again, people don't understand.

B Proud: 8:19

The media would always portray the LGBTQ community in pride, marches or protests and scantily clad men and with bellow scarves and so forth, and that's not who we are. That's who we are, you know like. Maybe for 30 days in the year we celebrate, but the rest of the time we're paying the bills and buying cars and going to college and raising kids and all those other things. And I wanted the people to know that, and so I decided I would strip away all of the rainbow imagery and make black and white environmental portraits so you would see the space that people were inhabiting and hopefully that would lend another level of understanding.

B Proud: 9:00

And I would just ask people to look at the heart and soul of the subjects and who they are as people and that if you get to know someone it's a whole lot easier to accept them. If you know somebody and you like, oh they're okay, well, they're gay, but oh well, that's all right, they're good people, and I was trying to get to that point. I thought also that each of the portraits is accompanied by a story, so I decided I was going to learn video and teach myself video so that I could interview the couples and then I would have film footage plus I could have it transcribed, so I wouldn't have to take a lot of notes and I could write the text that would go next to the portraits.

Brad Shreve: 9:38

And I love that you did in black and white. They're gorgeous. And listen to explain the book. It's one page, that's a couple in black and white and photographs are just beautiful, and then just one page a brief description of who they are. Is that correct?

B Proud: 9:51

Yeah it fills the page mostly, but talks about who they are as people and what it's like to be together, what makes their relationship thrive and what sort of obstacles they've overcome in order to be together for any number of years. My premise was we're already living for decades ostensibly as married, just without the rights. We have to spend a lot of money on legal documents to protect us that other people don't have to do, but we're living just like they are.

Brad Shreve: 10:19

And it's interesting that Prop 8 and some of the other lies I've passed are what motivated you to do this, because in a sense, I think that really made a difference and really helped to make a change. You mentioned pride parades and I love to participate them and I love to go over the top, but before I came out, I really resented them because I didn't want to be a woman. I didn't understand trans people at all, or now I look back and boy, I was ignorant and I also didn't want to wear a gold thong and dance on a float, so I didn't connect with that at all. Now, coming out, I love it, but I think your choice to do that in black and white was a very smart move for many people to see the real person.

B Proud: 11:03

Yeah, I'm, black and white is classic photography and it just in a way I don't want to say it's more emotional, but you get to the heart and the soul of the people without other distractions. I say that now, but transcending love is in color.

Brad Shreve: 11:17

Well, and we're going to get to why. There's a reason why he chose to do that. The day before the decision was made, it was announced that there's going to be a march in Long Beach and the march will either be a celebration or a protest, and unfortunately, as you know, it turned out to be a protest. But what made me feel really good about it is it wasn't a parade, it wasn't a festival. It was people angry and they were out in numbers unbelievable. So it's that pendulum, like okay, you just did this to us, and now we're really pissed off and we're motivated.

B Proud: 11:52

Yeah, in New York now there's a counter march to the Pride march because the Pride march has become so corporate that a lot of people I forget what the name of it is, but they've gone back to the original reason for the march and it happens separately and it's much more a protest.

Brad Shreve: 12:09

Yeah, and you know what? I don't mind the corporations catering to the LGBTQ community. I think it's much better than back when they ignored us and it acknowledges that they know that we are a buying power. But I do agree it's got a little overboard that you go to a Pride parade and it's AT&T and every major corporation going by and occasionally you'll see some organization waving their hand that there needs to be a balance. I'm glad they're there, but that they're acknowledges, regardless of what their policies are the rest of the year. At least they're seeing that we're getting their attention.

B Proud: 12:41

Yeah, and I get to see people wearing my name on their shirt all over the place.

Brad Shreve: 12:50

Well, that must be your favorite time of year if you have an ego.

B Proud: 12:55

That's pretty funny.

Brad Shreve: 13:01

It's critical. People know what's going on and read the headlines, which typically, though, focus on the struggles we face. It's important, but, for Sandy's sake, we need to hear the good stuff too, and there's more of it than you may think. My goal is to present the bright side of life to LGBTQ people. I think it's important. If you do, too, please tell a friend about Queer. We are telling them in conversation is great, but one simple way is to share this episode or any of the others easily. You can do it right there in your app. You get that grimace off that someone's face and let them know where to find the good stuff. Send them here to Queer we are. You're talking about the exhibits that you have, and you are married with your wife, allison, and Delaware, and you're an adjunct professor in Philadelphia. You go on all these tours. You do commercial photography, you do artistic photography. Where do you find the time for all of this?

B Proud: 14:00

It's not easy, that's for sure, but you just make it happen. I've got a super supportive wife who has always had my back through this process, even when during first comes love I had. My mother and my aunt were both in their 90s and ended up having to be having to have a lot of care and Allison would just say go do what you have to do. I've got this, so that's super important and we have a beach house now, so we get to go away and just kind of chill.

Brad Shreve: 14:30

So what does Bee do, though, when Bee needs to shut down and give time to herself?

B Proud: 14:34

I'd be with my family and my dogs. I love my dogs so much.

Brad Shreve: 14:39

How many dogs do you have?

B Proud: 14:40

Two.

Brad Shreve: 14:41

My husband's a dog lover. I love dogs, but they're too codependent to me. A cat will come up and cuddle, but when you toss them away, they go away. Mad Dogs time. I love other people's dogs, Absolutely adore other people's dogs. So back to Transending Love Project. This time, rather than black and white, you made a choice to photograph in color. Why did you do that?

B Proud: 15:04

It just kind of happened. I mean, I thought I was going to basically do. I had been asked to do volume two, so I couldn't do that. So after the 2016 election, the doors of bigotry opened wide and it became clear to me that there was more work to do and I finally got the message that I had to do it. But I was going to do it for the community that was needed the most.

B Proud: 15:27

So I thought I would do the same thing. I would follow the same formula, but rather than long-term relationships, I would just go with committed relationships without a time factor involved, and couples and families, because I think focusing on the love makes it even more acceptable. So if you see portraits of transgender people, that's one thing, but when you see a trans couple, you see something else. You see people that are dedicated to each other, you see them thriving, you see them in love and I think it banners a little bit more respect and helps with the acceptance. So I wanted to follow basically the same formula and the first portrait I took was the trans men, the one who was very pregnant and hours away from delivery.

B Proud: 16:11

I flew to Las Vegas and I took the photos, and when I looked at them later, I mean I was in love with them. I just was like, ok, this is the right thing to do. But when I looked at them later, in black and white, it just was not speaking to me and I think that making them in color is absolutely the right decision, because the transgender community is anything but black and white. It's a full spectrum of people and there are so many ways to be trans, it's not just one way. So I think that being in color is the right thing.

Brad Shreve: 16:42

And that is the picture that really jumped out at me for a couple of reasons. Without having seen all the photos, my first thought was, oh, I bet this is the most controversial in the book. But at the same time I found it was absolutely beautiful to me. These two men chose to have a child and have one together. And yeah, that baby is ready to come out.

B Proud: 17:03

Yeah, he was having labor pains as we photographed. Yeah, we couldn't do the interview, they had to stop. But I agree with you that that picture shocks a lot of people, including very liberal people. It's still jarring, but I think that if people just take one minute to look beyond that and see the tenderness and the love that's between the two of them, then that says everything.

Brad Shreve: 17:28

And that's exactly what I felt. But I also understand people. The world is easier to understand when things are black and white. So when you have a man who is a man and a woman who is a man, even if they're two transgender men, they're men, but oh, wait a minute. All of a sudden one's pregnant and you've just really wait a minute. Everything's blurry now and I don't get that, and that's very difficult for people. It's a learning process and I think you've really helped with that process. There's a quote that is attributed to you and you can tell me whether you made it or not, but it is an article about you, and here's the quote Is a lesbian who becomes a trans man and is in a relationship with a cisgender woman. Now, straight Doesn't matter. Why do labels need to define one of the deepest emotions on the planet? Why does love even need to be explained? It just is.

B Proud: 18:19

That's my quote.

Brad Shreve: 18:20

Yes, I love that quote. Why do you think it is that people care about something that just shouldn't be their business?

B Proud: 18:28

I wish I knew. I wish I knew. People get very worked up about things that really don't even affect them at all. There's no reason.

Brad Shreve: 18:38

Do you think it may have something like what I just brought a moment ago, that people like things simple?

B Proud: 18:44

Well, they fear what they don't understand. So, yes, they like it simple and if they don't understand it then they want to back away from it, and I think that's the job is to bring it to them in a way that they can understand it, they can accept it a little bit easier. And I think that, seeing many of the couples in this particular project, they look like a straight couple. They may look like a very attractive straight couple and they both may be trans, or one may be trans or one may be non-binary. It's different, but they're very beautiful people and I think when they see that then it's like wait what? They look normal. Well, as Mother Flawless Sabrina says, normal is a setting on the dryer. So what's normal? And why can't people just love who they love and thrive? You know it's so much easier to accept and love than anger. Anger takes a lot of energy.

B Proud: 19:41

Are you still looking for couples for the project?

B Proud: 19:44

Yes, I mean, I keep an Excel spreadsheet that has well over 100 couples on it and I've photographed 74 of them.

B Proud: 19:55

Wow, it's a very expensive project. So for me, I thought that it would be the most powerful if I could cover the most geographic diversity, ethnic diversity, age diversity, socioeconomic diversity, all of that. And so traveling the country, and especially to some of the states in the middle of the country or the more conservative states, I thought would be important to say that this isn't just New York and San Francisco, so it's expensive and that makes it difficult to do and I can't really fly to Utah for one couple. I have to wait until there might be three or four or five couples and that way if I spend the money to get there and they get sick or somebody gets sick, I'm not just out of luck. I do keep taking the names of people getting them scheduled as the hardest thing, because it does take three, four, five, sometimes even longer to do these sessions and they have to be willing to dedicate the time for it and some can and some can't seem to do it.

Brad Shreve: 20:56

But no shortage of people that are interested.

B Proud: 20:59

No, I'll keep that list going. I don't know when a book will happen. I'm working on it. I just haven't like hit the sweet spot of knowing exactly what. I want to push it forward. It's close.

Brad Shreve: 21:12

I will say this based on all the photos and everything that you have so far when it does come out in book format, it will be on my coffee table without a doubt. Oh great, you graduated back in 1974. And that was five years after Stonewall. And it was also a miraculous year in science because overnight LGBTQ people were instantly cured of mental illness because American psychiatric session changed their mind.

B Proud: 21:38

Thank you, Barbara Giddings.

Brad Shreve: 21:41

So I'm curious when did you come out and what was that experience like?

B Proud: 21:45

Oh, hmm, I would say my first experiences were in high school, so 73-ish four, and then I still wasn't really out out. And I wasn't out out in college for a while either. It took me some time, and once I realized my sexuality then it still took a while for me to actually let the rest of my world know that that was the case. And now it's great. I mean, I teach it in an art school and I can be very open there, and it's wonderful because I can provide a safe space for my students to be open as well.

Brad Shreve: 22:29

Looking back at that young lady in 1974, did you expect that day to come?

B Proud: 22:34

No, never, never. And I never expected that we would be allowed to be married either and that the White House would be lit up in rainbow colors. I never, ever, ever thought that would happen.

Brad Shreve: 22:47

Are there other things that you didn't expect to see that you're seeing today? Because we know there's some not so good stuff going on, but we're still way ahead of what we were in 1974. So what if it's some things that you didn't expect to see?

B Proud: 23:00

Wow, that's a good question. I don't know. I think just the fact that people are open now and you know we'll walk down the street holding hands or kiss, and now they're on television, all over television, which I think is fantastic, I didn't know there was many trans people as there are, so I'm glad I know this now, but also that they will be out and prevalent and fighting for their rights, rightly so I don't think trans people, I don't know.

Brad Shreve: 23:28

I feel like anybody knew how many trans people got, and that's the wonderful thing is that we all know that 10% homosexual number that came out back in the 50s, I think it was. We're learning that and people were like, oh, that 10% is way too high. Now we're learning it's actually low. Yeah, what a wonderful thing. Yeah, you made a short film regarding Edith Windsor called the Circle of Diamonds, and I want to toss something out before that. My husband, maurice, and I married in 2007, in June of 2007. That is our wedding day Now. Legally, we got married in courthouse about two years or so ago and I don't remember the date and, quite honestly, I don't give a damn. It's not important. It was filling out some legal paperwork, doesn't matter to me when it was and what I'm curious about. You made this short film, the Circle of Diamonds, that played in 16 film festivals.

B Proud: 24:20

More than 20 now.

Brad Shreve: 24:21

Oh, more than 20. Okay, I was looking at old information, yeah. So why was the film important? Who was Edith Windsor?

B Proud: 24:29

for those that don't know, Well, edith Windsor was the deceased now, sadly, the octogenarian that took her case to the Supreme Court and brought down the first part of the Defense of Marriage Act in the 2013 decision. So Edie and Thea were together for 44 years when Thea passed away and Edie was faced with a very hefty inheritance tax because Thea was Thea and not Theo, and she just would not accept it and she was determined that she was going to fight it and everybody said, no, you can't do that, it's too soon, you're going to ruin everything. We've got a long way to go. And she just would not take it. And she pushed forward and, thank goodness, and she won. So that really laid the groundwork for the Obergefell decision.

Brad Shreve: 25:25

But they did get legally married in Canada in 2000. They did Mm-hmm. So they were at least legally married somewhere, even though it wasn't recognized in the United States. It wasn't recognized here yet and it's so sad. Based on what you know, I don't know how close you got to know Edith before she died Really Well, when did they get married again?

B Proud: 25:44

I think it was maybe just a year-ish before Thea died. She was ill, she had MS. I think that it was very important for them to get married, and so the friends helped them do that and got them to Canada and they were able to be married before Thea passed.

Brad Shreve: 26:05

Based on what you know, I mean, they were basically a married couple, regardless of what the law said for many years Exactly. That's why I brought up the situation with my husband and I. Do you think that whole the marriage in Canada was simply a formality to acknowledge something to love, or was it symbolic in something they thought was important that we should see in the United States? Do you have any idea?

B Proud: 26:28

I think it was important for them to acknowledge to each other that you mean this much to me and I want to promise to be your partner for my entire life and for them to be able to together celebrate that love.

Brad Shreve: 26:41

I will say that, despite that being a very sad story, I find it incredibly beautiful at the same time. So you've seen a lot of change over the years. In the 70s it was a difficult time. We had Anita and Jerry doing their thing and we saw some great things happen. And now we're seeing some challenges, what has given you hope to move forward.

B Proud: 27:04

Well, I think that we've made a lot of progress over the years. As you said, homosexuality was a mental illness. It's not legally considered that anymore. So we keep making strides, even though we keep getting pushed back, and I think that as long as we're out there and, as I just say repeatedly, having the conversations, I think we'll move forward. That Martin Luther King's statement about the arc of justice bends, or the moral arc bends towards justice. You have to push it or pull it. It's not just going to bend. So you've got to not be afraid to have the conversations and I will have them with people wherever I go. In the middle of Kentucky with two I'm going to be stereotypical now but two guys in trucker hats and flannel shirts and beards having dinner next to me at a bar, and they want to know who are you and why are you here, what are you doing? And I just take a deep breath and tell them and then I show them the photographs and I watch their heads tilt Like what Wait Huh?

Brad Shreve: 28:10

Planting seeds.

B Proud: 28:11

Yeah, exactly, I'm planting seeds and if you know, when I leave I've cracked the door open a little bit that they've seen something that they've never seen before. In a way, they've never seen it before and they learned something. At the exhibition I just had in May, many people came to me and said that they learned so much, and one woman came up to be crying that she lived in the neighborhood and often frequented the gallery and she had to go because it was something that was very different from what they ever showed there and she wanted to see what it was about. And she was just crying that this is so amazing and so beautiful and I learned so much and everybody needs to see this.

Brad Shreve: 28:51

So, listen, if you want to learn one thing from this episode, it's keep talking. It's the greatest weapon we have, mm-hmm, keep talking. It absolutely is. So be as your projects is so important. Like I said, it's beautiful and I love it when art can be used to change hearts and minds, and I see that happening with yours. If somebody wants to donate to your organization, where would they go?

B Proud: 29:12

They can go to firstcomesloveorg or transcendingloveorg. There are two separate websites, one for each project, and there's a link there to a place called Fractured Atlas, which is our fiscal sponsor. So what that means is that they're kind of the umbrella 501c3 that accepts donations, which also means that any donation of any amount is tax deductible.

Brad Shreve: 29:37

And listen. I will have the links to those in the show notes so they'll be very easy for you to collect. You can even click on them now and still continue to hear the rest of our conversation as we say goodbye. It has been a pleasure, Thank you. Thank you so much for all you do.

B Proud: 29:50

Thank you. Thank you for this opportunity. I really appreciate it.

Brad Shreve: 29:56

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