"A Constellation of Many Bodies of Understanding" A Conversation with Tourmaline

In this episode, FQT podcast host Che speaks with their sister, the artist, filmmaker, writer, and activist, Tourmaline. Tourmaline's practice highlights the experiences of Black, queer, and trans communities and their capacity to impact the world. Her films and photographs rewrite mainstream narratives and cultural histories to initiate a paradigm shift and imagine a more pleasure-filled future. Tourmaline's practice invites us to fundamentally reshape our beliefs about what is possible. In the episode they discuss Tourmaline's books, the national best seller Marsha: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson, published by Reparations Books at Random House in 2025, and her children's book One Day in June published by Penguin Press, as well as her films Happy Birthday Marsha, Salacia and recently, Pollinator, which won the 2022 Baloise Art Prize and was included in the 2024 Whitney Biennial, and her portraits, which are in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Tourmaline's work is also part of an upcoming exhibition at the Barnes Foundation, Freedom Dreams.