‘Queer’ Asia is a network of queer-identifying academics, filmmakers & artists. The fifth annual ‘Queer’ Asia Film Festival (QAFF), held at ONCA Gallery, explores the theme of survival in our difficult times.

How do LGBTQI+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex) individuals and communities navigate their everyday living conditions at the intersections of the pandemic, queerness, and different forms of hierarchies, crises, controls, and discriminations, including heterosexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc? How do we transgress global normativities, including the hegemonic discourse of temporality and space, challenge national and colonial ideologies, and manifest the impossibility of queer hopes, desires, and dreams? How do we revisit our past, create our present, and imagine the possibility and potentiality of queer futurity? Let us explore the glorious power of the queer art of survival.

The line-up:

About QAFF

As an annual celebration of films from across Asia, including Asian diasporas, QAFF has showcased a wide diversity of films from across Asia, including Azerbaijan, China, India, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Myanmar, The Philippines, Pakistan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey and Viet Nam in Central London venues including The British Museum, SOAS, King’s College London, and University College London. QAFF has also collaborated with different organisations, including The British Museum, Club Kali, CINEMQ, SOAS, University of London, University of Warwick, King’s College London.

Since its launch in 2017, the film festival has grown significantly. The number of films being screened rose steadily from 11 films in 2017, to 33 in 2018 and over 80 in 2019, the last year the festival was held before the COVID-19 pandemic. Similarly, the number of tickets sold to festival increased from 500 in 2017 to nearly 2500 in June 2019.

During its existence, QAFF has also attracted extensive media coverage including BBC Impact and BBC World News, Rife Magazine, Gay Star News, CUNTemporary, The Guardian, Attitude Magazine. Films from the QAFF lineup have been showcased on TV programmes in the UK such as Brighton TV, and in private screenings at major companies.