Better Seen, Better Heard: Trans Allyship Within Museum Spaces

Museums that put forth content on gender diversity can face a tumultuous reception, as evidenced by protests against Love Me Gender, an exhibition held between May 2023 and April 2024 at the Musée de la civilisation in Quebec City, Canada. Reactions are exacerbated by the current social context, in which intolerance toward trans people is rising. Preceding the Musée de la civilisation’s exhibit by just a year, the McCord Stewart Museum in Montréal, Canada, presented JJ Levine: Queer Photographs, a retrospective exhibition showing the work of trans artist JJ Levine. Taking these two exhibitions as case studies, this comparative analysis shows how different museum approaches can lead to very different outcomes in terms of public reception and impact on trans communities.