Website in development! Check back 7/25
Website in development! Check back 7/25
See the bars, interviews, and all the queer spaces—karaoke, dorms, games, a futuristic island—documented here.
L-BAR
An Interactive Generative Queer Women’s Bar Storyworld
“L-BAR is an interactive multi-media trip down a very important road, alley, dark street, underground space—the lesbian bar… It is crucial historical art of the highest level.” Marie Cartier, author of Baby, You Are My ReligionL-BAR was a virtual, interactive bar world I created between 2021 and 2023—born out of the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic and my deep longing for connection, nightlife, and queer community. Inspired by an experimental space I visited on Ohyay during the IDFA documentary festival in Amsterdam, I set out to build my own generative, story-rich queer women’s bar universe—one where people could hang out, explore, and feel immersed in a shared history.
The project recreated some of the most iconic lesbian bars across time and geography—including Mona’s 440 Club in San Francisco, the If Club in Los Angeles, The Lexington Club, and Le Monocle in Paris. These virtual bars were not just simulations; they were interactive spaces filled with music, performance, queer rituals, and memory. You could sit at the bar, clink glasses with a friend, sneak into the restroom, or watch historical figures like Gladys Bentley or Gertrude Stein perform. It was playful and intimate, yet rooted in cultural history.
Over the course of the project, I conducted oral history interviews with people across the U.S. who had actually been to these now-shuttered bars. Their voices—everyday patrons, bar owners, and iconic figures like Chrystos and Lillian Faderman—were woven into the environments themselves. You could literally sit in a booth or lean on the bar and hear someone tell their story, layered into the space. I called it a “history of the present.”
L-BAR was presented to platforms like Snapchat and USC, and I spoke about the project at institutions including Cal State Northridge, Cal State Los Angeles, Old Dominion, and Michigan State. It was also featured in the inaugural Circa: Queer Histories event by the ONE Archives Foundation.
More than anything, L-BAR was a living archive—a celebration of desire, memory, and queer futurity. It imagined what it means to document from inside the story, not outside of it.
See the bars, interviews, and all the queer spaces—karaoke, dorms, games, a futuristic island—documented here.