Arleen Olshan, a Mt. Airy–based artist and activist, opens her latest exhibition “Arleen Olshan: The Tangle I’ve Gotten Into” on Jan. 16 at iMPeRFeCT Gallery in Germantown, running through Feb. 21. The show combines two series: “Dead Dykes & Some Gay Men,” a memorial portrait series honoring LGBTQ+ activists and loved she has lost—including a long-delayed painting of her friend Gil Forman and his partner Zach—and “Women Loving Women,” large-scale figurative works from the 1970s and 1980s celebrating lesbian feminist intimacy and liberation. The exhibition also includes an archival element of memorial cards and newspaper clippings Olshan saved over decades.
This exhibition marks a full-circle moment for Olshan, who co-coordinated the original Gay Community Center (now William Way LGBT Community Center) in Philadelphia in 1976 and organized its first art show. Fifty years later, the Center is presenting her latest work, underscoring the enduring legacy of early LGBTQ+ community organizing and art-making. Olshan’s portraits and archival materials serve as a vital record of a generation lost to HIV/AIDS, while her celebration of lesbian feminist art offers younger audiences a tangible connection to a pivotal era of queer history and activism.