Curatorial Policy

It is the mission of ImageOut: The Rochester Lesbian & Gay Film & Video Festival, to inform, entertain, educate, and enrich all members of the LGBTQ+ community in the Greater Rochester and Western New York area. It is also our mission to foster connections among people from all racial, religious, gender, sexual, ability, class, economic, age, and ethnic groups as a major thread in the progressive art and cultural fabric of the region.

In addition, one of the stated purposes of ImageOut is to foster education about and public discussion of LGBTQ+ issues, and to advance the opportunities for equity, social justice, and democracy through the mediums of film, video, art, and poetry.

Keeping in mind both our mission and our purpose, we feel it is our responsibility to represent all aspects of LGBTQ+ life in what we do. Our program curators face choices when it comes to films that include issues that may be controversial individually and/or collectively for those within and outside the LGBTQ+ community. It is our policy to include detailed descriptions of each film in our printed program and on our website. Our curators strive to be accurate in these descriptions.

Because we are part of a community that has been and continues to be censored and disclaimed, it is ImageOut’s policy to neither censor materials screened in our festival nor to print explicit disclaimers. For this reason it becomes the responsibility of audience members to read the material provided and to make informed decisions about programs they attend.