Proud Brighton
We Are Community
A portrait project marking 35 years of Pride in Brighton & Hove
Proud Studios CIC and Brighton Pride CIC are excited to present Proud Brighton – We Are Community, a portrait photography project celebrating 35 years of Pride in Brighton & Hove.
The images are on display at Jubilee Library, Brighton, from 27 July to 15 August 2026, and across the city on lamppost banners. They will also be appearing on placards in the Pride Parade.
Commissioned by Brighton Pride CIC, the project is part of United in Pride, a joint initiative bringing together Brighton & Hove Pride, Trans Pride Brighton and Brighton Bear Weekend. The project features portraits of people drawn from all three communities, each accompanied by a single sentence about what Pride means to them, reflecting Pride as it is actually lived across the city.
The series was conceived and photographed by Chris Jepson, award-winning community photographer and founder of Proud Studios CIC and features long-timers and first-timers, performers and volunteers, organisers and attendees. The portraits set out to capture the full range of Pride in Brighton & Hove, with particular attention to voices and faces that are often absent from Pride photography, including older community members, disabled LGBTQIA+ people, people of colour, and trans and non-binary people.
Chris Jepson said: “This project continues my long-term commitment to photographing LGBTQIA+ lives. For over thirty years, my work has centred on visibility, authorship and who gets to be seen. One of the things I care most about is removing the gatekeeping of who appears in photography, allowing for a more democratic, community-led curation. Proud Brighton – We Are Community is a portrait exhibition marking the 35th anniversary of Brighton & Hove Pride. These portraits are a reminder that our community has never been a single story – and that Pride belongs to everyone who shows up.”
Paul Kemp, Managing Director of Brighton Pride CIC, said: “Thirty-five years is a remarkable milestone, and we wanted to mark it in a way that felt genuinely true to our community. Proud Brighton does exactly that. At a time when LGBTQIA+ rights are under pressure across the world, visibility matters more than ever, and the portraits that Chris has created are a powerful act of representation. This is not a celebration of an idea of Pride, it is a celebration of real people, real lives and a community that continues to show up for each other. We are incredibly proud to have commissioned this work and to live in this vibrant, inclusive and diverse city.”
More at: proud-studios.co.uk/proud-brighton
