Activists have long used colour schemes to represent and celebrate the spectrum of human gender and sexuality. These colour schemes have evolved and expanded over time. They are commonly used in flags, clothing, accessories, and public installations.
The colours are typically set out as stripes. Each colour stripe, and the organization of the stripes, represents a particular meaning. For example, in the original Rainbow flag, designed by Gilbert Baker in 1978, eight coloured stripes were stacked on top of each other to form a rainbow, a symbol of hope. Each colour was assigned a specific meaning: pink for sex, red for life, orange for healing, yellow for sunlight, green for nature, turquoise for magic, indigo for serenity, and violet for spirit. The flag was embraced internationally as the symbol of the LGBTQ community. It inspired others to create additional designs to represent other gender and sexual identities. For example, the Progress Pride Flag incorporated the colours black and brown to represent people of colour, while the colours pink, light blue, and white represent people who are transgender, non-binary, intersex, or otherwise exist outside of the cisgender binary.
One of these flags is more ambiguous in its meaning. It is called the Abrosexual flag. As the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus explains, the flag “is meant to represent those who have fluid sexual orientation and those whose sexual orientation might shift over time. It features a set of five horizontal stripes in shades of pink, white, and green. It’s unknown why these colours were chosen.” Rather than basing the visual appearance on a random and unexplained selection of specific colours and composition, it is relevant and necessary to rethink how to represent this concept of fluidity.
I have produced an example of this approach, which I share with this article.
Metaphorically, I envision the colours as those that could be found in a field of flowers, which may be composed in a distinct and rigid layout and/or may be intertwined and fluid. Also, it is preferable not to convey fluidity using a particular random colour or set of colours or a rigid composition of these. Instead, fluidity can be conveyed by any mix of colours set out in any mix of rigid, distinct, interconnected and intertwining layouts. In my artwork, I attempt to achieve this as follows.
The artwork features the diversity of images of male, female, and other gender(s). They are all interconnected, which reminds us that despite their differences they share a common uniting core: humanity. As for their sexuality, while they are surrounded at the right of the composition by a display of rigid stripes that represent some of the different forms of sexuality, these colours also flow through the dynamic and fluid flower scheme at the left of the composition. Here, it is not a particular colour, or set of colours, or discrete organization that represents fluidity. Rather, fluidity is suggested by various colours that intertwine and are interconnected.
Of course, this composition is just one of many possibilities by which to convey the diversity and fluidity of gender and sexuality through colour and shape. I encourage others to also explore how to visually convey this message, with the hope of promoting, through art, recognition, tolerance, and celebration of the diversity and fluidity of gender and sexuality.
