Queer|Art debuts its TEE SHOP with an inaugural design by Avram Finkelstein—the artist behind the seminal SILENCE=DEATH mark. For this first edition, Finkelstein presents an unreleased graphic from his personal archives, originally created for his fictional band, The Gender Traitors. The tee showcases a central guitar illustration ringed by the band’s name, with “World Tour 2004”—the year of its creation—rendered in script below.
Here, Avram wears his original version of the shirt, photographed by Ryan McGinley. The left sleeve features a signature mark bearing the names of Queer|Art and Avram Finkelstein. This mark will sign all future TEE SHOP editions in the same placement, updated to reflect each participating artist.
This tee is crafted from 100% ring-spun cotton and garment-dyed for an easy, lived-in softness. It is digitally printed with water-based ink and fits true to size with a relaxed silhouette and minimal shrink. The fabric is sturdy and perfect for everyday wear–not too heavy, not too light.
The back of the shirt showcases an imagined set list created internally by Queer|Art—an interpretation of what the band might have titled their songs—developed with the permission and encouragement of Finkelstein. Songs include “Outlive These Creeps,” “I Can Be Your (Tax Deduction),” and “Fifteen (And Mad About It),” the latter playfully nodding to the upcoming 15-year anniversary of Queer|Art.
Offered for a limited time, this tee is available in exchange for a donation to Queer|Art beginning at $50, with increased contributions warmly encouraged. All profits from the TEE SHOP will directly benefit Queer|Art's mission of serving a diverse and vibrant community of LGBTQ+ artists across generations and disciplines.
Confirmed upcoming TEE SHOP artist tees will feature new works by Julio Torres, Hannah and Spike Einbinder, Lola Flash, Megami, Laurel Charleston, Fran Tirado, and Willie Norris, who will also provide overall creative direction for the project. Each shirt will be released as an open edition for a limited time. For all inquiries please contact Communications Manager, Andrius Alvarez-Backus, at andrius@queer-art.org
Avram Finkelstein is an artist and writer living in Brooklyn, a 2024 Creative Capital and 2023 Pollock-Krasner Grant recipient, and a founding member of the Silence=Death and Gran Fury collectives. He is featured in the American Artist oral history project at the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art. His book, After Silence: A History of AIDS Through its Images, is available through University of California Press, and was nominated for an International Center of Photography' 2018 Infinity Award in Critical Writing and Research, and a 30th Annual Lambda Literary Award in LGBT Nonfiction. He has work in the permanent collections of MoMA, the Whitney, the Metropolitan Museum, the New Museum, the Smithsonian, the Brooklyn Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the New York Public Library, and his work has shown at the Whitney Museum, The Shed, the Metropolitan Museum, the New Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, the Hirschhorn Museum, the Cooper Hewitt Museum, Grey Art Gallery, the Migros Museum, the Museum of the City of New York, and the Leslie Lohman Museum. He has had numerous public commissions and residencies, including the The Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program, Pioneer Works and The Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics.
Willie Norris is a fashion designer and creative director with a thing for words. Characterized by The New York Times as a “master of bringing together,” her style is direct, poetic, and communal—an apt encapsulation of the practice she has developed and deploys through Willie Norris WORKSHOP, the creative practice and commercial imprint she founded in 2018.
Through WILLIE NORRIS WORKSHOP, her work earnestly seeks to offer wayfinding and provisional clarity for a contemporary, corporeal experience. It engages themes of modern misery, yearning, dread, escape, intimacy, connection, delusion, forgiveness, personal responsibility, and play.
Notable recent projects include serving as Creative Director for the 2025 Performance Space Gala and for Doll Invasion. Her varied roster of external brand, institutional, and community collaborators and beneficiaries includes AWAY, Dieux, Helmut Lang, Outlier, Planned Parenthood, Gotham FC, MoMA PS1, and G.L.I.T.S.
Her work is held in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute and the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Her story and work have been covered internationally by VOGUE, GQ, The New York Times, The Financial Times, i-D, W and many others.