Following the launch of Queercore in the Second City, our new documentary, produced by Centrala, Centrala presents a photography exhibition documenting Birmingham’s vibrant Queercore scene, by Ryley Morton.
Over eight months, documentary photographer Ryley Morton immersed himself in the city’s Queer Hardcore shows, capturing the raw energy, joy, and solidarity that defines the movement. His work offers an intimate portrait of a community built from DIY ethics, political defiance, and the urgent need for spaces where queer people can be loud, visible, and unapologetically themselves.
This exhibition traces the connections between music, place, and identity, exploring how the Queercore scene has taken root in Birmingham’s cultural soil. Visitors will encounter powerful images that reflect the catharsis, belonging, and hope this scene offers to those often excluded from mainstream culture.
Alongside showcasing the live energy of gigs, the work also invites reflection on the political and social roots of queercore, punk, and hardcore: anti-fascist, anti-capitalist, and anti-establishment at their core. It asks audiences to consider whether the current heavy music scene still embodies those politics, or whether they have evolved into something new.
Queercore in the Second City: Loud and Queer is both a celebration and an invitation: a celebration of a thriving, defiant community, and an invitation for more people to see themselves as part of it.
23/08 – 14/09/25, 12-6PM, Tues – Sat
About the Documentary
Queercore in the Second City is a documentary exploring Birmingham’s thriving Queer Hardcore (queercore) scene, a subculture rooted in punk’s DIY ethos, community building, and queer resistance. Produced by Centrala and commissioned by the Royal Geographical Society, the film captures a unique moment in time where music, identity, and place collide.
Through interviews with organisers, performers, and gig-goers, Queercore in the Second City sheds light on the importance of creating safe, autonomous spaces for queer expression within heavy music scenes. The documentary traces the roots of queercore from its punk origins to its current resurgence, asking why these spaces remain vital today.
Against the backdrop of Birmingham’s working-class history and its legacy as the birthplace of heavy metal, the film shows how queercore has found a natural home in the Second City, blending energy with radical care, and defiance with joy.
Queercore in the Second City is a testament to the enduring power of grassroots cultural spaces, and the people who fight to keep them alive.
Credits:
Directed and produced by Centrala
Executive producer Lexi Bushell
Filmed by Ryley Morton, Kimberly Barber, and Spence Hackett
Edited by Lexi Bushell
Commissioned by the Royal Geographical Society