On April 2, 2026, The Block Museum of Art hosted an online collection talk exploring artworks from the museum’s collection in dialogue with the biography Marsha: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson by Tourmaline.

Led by Curatorial Associate Llewyn Blossfeld and facilitated by Engagement Coordinator and Educator Isabella Ko, the program considered how artists across generations have engaged questions of queer and trans life, representation, and activism.

The conversation was part of the Women’s Center’s 40th anniversary programming and its 2025–2026 theme, Legacies of Living Free. In honor of the anniversary, the Women’s Center has invited the Northwestern Community to connect deeply and collectively with a single text, Marsha: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson by Tourmaline.  The Block was proud to partner with the Women’s Center to explore the themes of this shared text, selecting artworks from the museum collection that can broaden campus discussions. 

Blossfeld’s talk centered on works from the Block’s collection, including Caprice, 55, Chicago, IL, 2015 by Jess T. Dugan and Vanessa Fabbre. Moving between photography, protest imagery, and portraiture, he traced connections between these works and the life and legacy of Marsha P. Johnson.

Drawing on Tourmaline’s biography, the talk reflected on Johnson’s role in the gay rights movement, her participation in the Stonewall uprising, and her work with the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR). These histories surfaced the importance of chosen family, the creation of community spaces, and ongoing struggles for bodily autonomy, healthcare access, and safety.

These themes carried into the discussion of Andy Warhol’s Ladies and Gentlemen series, where visibility, authorship, and exploitation intersect. While the portraits have become iconic, the conditions under which they were produced reveal significant inequities. In contrast, Dugan and Fabbre’s To Survive on This Shore foregrounds the voices of its subjects, pairing portraits with first-person narratives and positioning the work as both an artwork and a teaching tool.

A key thread throughout was the question of representation and its limits. As Blossfeld noted, photographs offer only a partial view of a person’s life:

“A photograph is a still image in time. It doesn’t represent that person’s entire life… there’s no one trans narrative.”

Teaching and learning resource

To accompany this program, we are pleased to share a downloadable resource developed by Llewyn Blossfeld featuring artworks from The Block’s collection in dialogue with Marsha: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson.

👉 Download the full PDF: Teaching & Learning Through The Block’s Collection: Marsha

Featured works include:

• Mikki Ferrill, Untitled, Chicago, IL ( ca. 1965)
• Bev Grant, Women’s demonstration at the courthouse, Free Ericka Huggins and Bobby Seale Protest (1969)
• Jess T. Dugan and Vanessa Fabbre, Caprice, 55, Chicago, IL (2015)
• Andy Warhol, Ladies and Gentlemen (Broadway) (1974)
• Molly Jae Vaughan, Lateisha “Teish” Green, 400 Block of Seymour Street, Syracuse (2021)
• Jesse Freidin, Rahliek, Age 20, Virginia (2022)

The resource pairs each work with context and prompts drawn directly from the talk, offering an entry point for classroom discussion or individual reflection.