Give OUT Day for OUTsider Festival

Creating Space to Thrive: OUTsider and the Power of Queer Art in Texas

In the last year alone, $420 million has been funneled into anti-LGBTQ+ agendas nationwide. Here in Texas, 88 anti-queer bills have moved through the legislature, and federal attacks on DEI programs are making it harder for organizations like ours to survive. 

In a time when queer and trans lives in Texas face unprecedented challenges, the power of art and community becomes even more vital. For over 11 years, OUTsider has stood as a beacon, a queer arts festival and conference dedicated to amplifying LGBTQ+ voices through creativity, community, and joy.

OUTsider provides crucial platforms for queer artists to gather, experiment, and share their indispensable perspectives. Our festival and conference create a home where LGBTQ+ artists and audiences can connect, celebrate, and find strength in shared experiences, find strength in their fellow queerdos. In the face of legislative threats and broader societal headwinds, these artistic and community spaces offer more than just expression – they provide a vital lifeline.

Through art, we find the language to resist, to heal, and to build understanding. Community spaces become sanctuaries where individuals can feel seen, supported, and empowered. OUTsider is committed to fostering these connections and ensuring that queer art and artists not only survive but thrive.

To continue providing these essential platforms and nurturing this vibrant community, OUTsider needs your support. Help us keep this space alive, where art becomes a powerful act of resilience.

We Refuse to Back Down

OUTsider has always been unapologetically queer and trans-centered. That has cost us. We’ve lost nearly all of our public grant funding—simply because we refuse to water down our mission to please funders hostile to DEI and LGBTQ+ programming. Our ability to host international artists is being choked by border restrictions and political interference. And yet—we are not backing down.

We will not compromise. We will not be erased. But we need community support now more than ever to keep going.

What We’ve Built—Together

Since 2014, OUTsider has:

• Hosted over 500 queer and trans artists from around the world

• Produced an annual 5-day interdisciplinary festival + 3-day conference in Austin

• Created a one-of-a-kind Artist-in-Residence program (funded by the NEA)

• Brought hundreds of queers together each year to share stories, art, and kinship

• Operated for 7 years on 100% volunteer labor—every dollar going to artists and event production

In 2022, a grant from the City of Austin helped us offer modest pay to our part-time staff, expand programming, and better support our artists. That funding has now been cut annually, but our mission hasn’t changed.

This work matters—and it’s more urgent than ever.

Why It Matters

OUTsider is not just a festival. It’s a creative sanctuary. A place where queer and trans people are safe to be messy, experimental, loud, soft, weird, political, hilarious, and whole.

In a time when our communities are being criminalized, censored, and pushed out of public life, spaces like OUTsider are essential.

We provide:

• A stage for artists who are often shut out of traditional arts institutions

• A rare Texas-based hub for radical queer thought and practice

• A space where intergenerational, intersectional LGBTQ+ communities can thrive

• Support systems for queer artists to develop and present new work

• A platform for uncensored academic conversations 

The Hard Truth

Without your support, OUTsider cannot continue.

We’re raising $20,000 to sustain our work through 2025. These funds will:

• Keep our part-time staff employed

• Pay fair wages to artists and tech crew

• Help us keep the festival  accessible for differently abled audiences

Every dollar helps us survive and resist.

What You Can Do

1. Donate today—$25, $100, $1,000—every gift helps.

2. Become a monthly donor and give sustaining support.

3. Start a fundraiser and rally your community.

4. Share this page with your friends and networks.

5. Show up—in person, online, in solidarity.

A Final Word

This isn’t about charity. This is about solidarity.

We’re not asking for help because we’re failing. We’re asking for help because we’re succeeding—at doing something truly different, truly queer, and truly vital.

But we can’t do it without you.

Join us. Stand with us. Invest in us. And help us keep this fragile, beautiful, ferocious thing we’ve made—together.

Donate to OUTsider for Give OUT Day 2025. Let’s build the future we need