The Waiting Room Gallery
May 3–June 20, 2025
Solo Exhibition
SOAKIE’S WAS HOME is an interactive solo exhibition that tells the story of Soakie’s: a Black gay bar that operated in Downtown Kansas City from 1993 to 2004 before being forced to close due to an $850 million government-sponsored gentrification project. Twenty years since the bar’s closing, this exhibition explores how the memory of Soakie’s can build Black queer futurity. Curated by Nasir Anthony Montalvo, SOAKIE’S WAS HOME invites audiences via framed photographs and rare ephemera from Soakie’s, video histories of elders who frequented the bar in the 1990’s, and immersive analog media projections to consider their placement–literally and figuratively–amidst Kansas City’s past, present and future.
Archival materials used in this exhibition are populated from {B/qKC}: a Black queer community archive founded by Montalvo.
Exhibition Statement
“Montalvo presents “SOAKIE’S WAS HOME”: an interactive solo exhibition telling the story of Soakie’s, a Black gay bar in Downtown Kansas City from 1993-2004–ultimately shutdown by an $850m government-sponsored gentrification project. 20 years since the bar’s closing, this exhibition explores how we use Soakie’s’ memory to build Black queer futurity. Building from their previous exhibitory work with {B/qKC}, a community archive of Kansas City’s Black queer history, this particular show challenges audiences to consider their placement – literally and thematically – among the materials presented.“
Live video projection
Video poem
(photos captured by Lynnie Holl)
Gallery tour of SOAKIE’S WAS HOME
Works featured:
- Archival materials from {B/qKC}
- Framed materials from the gary_carrington_collection, {B/qKC}, 2023, image reproductions in frames of varying sizes and colors
- Framed materials from the starla_carr_collection, {B/qKC}, 2023, image reproductions in frames of varying sizes and colors
- Framed materials from the tisha_taylor_collection, {B/qKC}, image reproductions in frames of varying sizes and colors
- {B/qKC}’s “THE DIAGRAM,” 2025, airbrushed excerpts from “bad tats, jesus christ, lemons: everything is archival,” originally published in Syllabus on October 8, 2024
- STACKED CRTs, 2025, assemblage and 1 minute and 30 second video
- HOME, 2025, SD video poem with captions, no sound, 1 minute.
- PAST<>YOU<>FUTURE, 2025, live video projection
- THE BAR, 2025, wooden bar top with televisions, zines, and video histories of Black queer elders in Kansas City
Included Student Works
As part of this exhibitions, students from Kansas City Art Institute’s Black Student Union and Pride Art Coalition were invited to create original works inspired by {B/qKC}.
From left to right:
Xavier McKeithen & Fern Scott, Resilience, 2025, Laser-engraved plywood, fabric, thread, beads, canvas, 16 in x 20 in
Paige Dayton, Rainbow of Drag, 2025, Digital art on construction paper, 32 in x 11 in
Skippy Lenati, Beauty Comes From Inside, 2025, Ink on paper, 5.5 x 8.5 in
Brenna Jean-Paul, This Bridge Called My Back, 2025, Digital Illustration, 18.75 x 20.8 in
Elan Warren, Hidden in plane sight, 2025, Transfer on panel, graphite on vintage,11 x 14”
Bella Hernandez Lusk, Dress Her, 2025, Canvas, muslin, wire, ink on paper, 11 ½ “ X 13”
Lavender Yang, Miss America, 2025, Acrylic and Ink on Colored pencil Paper, 10 x 11 inches
Oliver Elwell, Acceptance, 2025, Acrylic on canvas, 8 x 10
Camarie Whayne, Modish Soakie’s, 2025, Magazine Collage, 12 x 14