TEP x PMA: A Three Story Takeover at The Philadelphia Museum of Art ~ A MEANINGFUL CELEBRATION OF QUEER PLEASURE + RESISTANCE / THE EROTIC PROJECT took over three stories of the Philadelphia Museum of Art for one-night-only on Friday March 28, 2025. The public event was a radical reclamation of space inside one of the country’s most esteemed institutions, centering queer pleasure, catharsis, and erotic expression at a time when queer ALAANA artists’ lives/livelihoods are being censored and threatened, with violent attempts of erasure. In response, this moment served as both a safe space and a haven to recharge within community, where celebration and grief coexist, where queer voices and love & loss stories are centered, and where folks can express freely—held in community with care, dignity, compassion, and lots of love.
In the museum’s Great Stair Hall, internationally acclaimed DJ and artist Mia Moretti performed a live set debuting her latest album, creating an immersive, sonic experience as house music fills the grand space with high energy and movement. Surrounding her performance, Aubrié Costello’s cell phone video projections paired with signature soft handmade/sewn silk graffiti fiber art flags transformed the space into a site of dynamic reflection, where words, fabric, film, music, and dance merge to tell a collective story of queer existence, resistance, and joy.
On the ground level, within a private screening room, attendees were invited to experience the full 40-minute short film program conceived and directed by Costello for THE EROTIC PROJECT on a big screen. The films, spanning from 2017 to 2023, are a visual archive of moving portraiture, new eroticism, creative exchanges, and mutual care, Through pretty cinematography and sonic storytelling, these films exist as both personal and political archives—gentle reminders that the act of being truly seen, in itself, remains revolutionary.
In the contemporary gallery, set against the newest comprehensive exhibition by celebrated artist Christina Ramberg, project contributors brought eroticism to life through live readings of original erotica works. This live reading series featured collaborators Mia Moretti, Candy Alexandra González, Arien Wilkerson, Kingsley Ibeneche, Shanina Dionna, and Beth Medina, whose voices weaved a powerful narrative of longing, sensuality, healing, self-preservation, and liberation. As their words filled the gallery, attendees were invited into an intimate listening experience to witness and be witnessed—challenging mainstream depictions of eroticism and offering instead nuanced, expansive visions of the erotic from a predominately queer lens.
For Costello and their project collaborators, this event was not just a party, performance, or screening—it was a necessary act of resistance and a container/sanctuary for what we need right now— more queer joy. As the world grows increasingly hostile toward marginalized voices, this night at the Philadelphia Museum of Art marked a rare moment where queer artists, storytellers, and audiences gathered, held in the embrace of art, sound, and community togetherness. This takeover was a declaration: Queer people exist. Queer bodies deserve space. Queer pleasure is art. Queer stories will not be erased. Queerness is not going anywhere. Together, it remains, ever expansive and eternally true.
This evening at the Philadelphia Museum of Art was a moment of transformation—a space where sound, movement, intimacy, and storytelling converged in defiance of erasure and in celebration of queer pleasure. All were welcomed to (re)connect & experience pleasure together.
