Queer Justice: 50 Years of Lambda Legal and LGBTQ+ Rights
Visual Identity, Exhibition, Architecture
Inugural exhibition for The American LGBTQ+ Museum that will travel to six major U.S. cities in 2024
Recognizing queer histories, imagining queer futures
For half a century, Lambda Legal has defended the rights of Americans across the LGBTQ+ spectrum—from decriminalizing intimacy among same-sex partners to upholding the personhood of queer youth and their families. Isometric collaborated with The American LGBTQ+ Museum and Lambda Legal to create Queer Justice: 50 Years of Lambda Legal and LGBTQ+ Rights, a traveling exhibition that will tour cultural centers in six major American cities. The design is rooted in an impassioned aesthetic of picket sign activism and protest, centering the people at the heart of every major queer rights case in U.S. history with a collage of bold graphics, original illustrations, and archival imagery. The exhibition amplifies the heroism of Lambda’s plaintiffs and attorneys, while also emphasizing the tangible impact of legal advocacy on the lives of real people.
Exhibition fabrication and installation by Parz Designs.
The language of activism made visible
Isometric designed a custom typeface, Lambda Sans, based on the headline of a 1970’s flyer by the Gay Activists Alliance. The flyer explains the significance of the lambda symbol to the LGBTQ+ movement, describing it as “an exchange of energy…a peoples’ will aimed at common oppressors.” The typeface adopts the raw, hand-carved aesthetic of the flyer headline, deploying select oblique characters and ligatures that create visual tension and energy in the composition of exhibition section titles. Bold, saturated colors and illustrations inspired by LGBTQ+ symbology further amplify the didactic content.
Activating community spaces across the nation
The traveling exhibition is designed as a set of five moveable carts, each of which comprises layered panels arranged on posts that rise above an ash wood base—evoking the visual of picket signs. The exhibition architecture flexibly adapts to the needs of multiple sites. The panel system is designed for efficient assembly and transportation, while also creating an emphatic sense of place as it activates each traveling destination. The front and back of each cart are symmetrical, resulting in a design that appears cogent and organized, and not overly complicated.
