Prague Pride is knocking on the door: How strong are our traditions and have trans people existed since the beginning of civilization?
Prague Pride is Prague's annual festival celebrating the LGBTQ+ community in our country and beyond. This festival includes various events such as marches, concerts, films, workshops and debates, which aim to promote equality and awareness in society.
The history of Prague Pride dates back to 2011, when the first event of this kind took place. The original idea was to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the repeal of Section 202 of the Criminal Code, which criminalized homosexual intercourse. The event met with great interest and success, and it was decided to make it a regular event.
Each year the festival has grown, attracting more and more participants and gaining support from various organisations and institutions. The marches during Prague Pride aim to introduce the LGBTQ+ community to the general public and fight for equality and protection of the rights of sexual minorities. This festival is also an opportunity for many people to express their support for equality and diversity.
Opening of Prague Pride - fun for the whole night
The official opening of this year's festival will traditionally take place at the Pride Village on Střelecký ostrov. Headlining the evening on Monday 7 August will be Irish musician Ailbhe Reddy, whose debut album Personal History was described by Clash magazine as feeling more like a work of art than an album. Norwegian DJ iDJa will introduce the Sami musical tradition and show how traditional songs from beyond the Arctic Circle can be combined with disco house. Buenos Aires musician Juana Rozas will bring a combination of hyperpop, gabber and house with elements of Argentine folklore. On Strelecki Island, she will mainly perform songs from her new album Vladi. The whole evening will be opened by the Czech DJ and promoter Henriette, a Prague Pride stalwart.
Pride Village will be alive with all genres on Monday and this time it will not end strictly at 10 pm. The fun will move a few meters further to the Pride Club in the underground K-kafe right on Střelecký ostrov. British producer Tom Aspaul, who has written songs for Kylie Minogue and AlunaGeorge, will open the new Pride club space on Monday with his DJ set. Last year, he headlined the Pride programme at Letná and loved Prague Pride. He will be joined on Monday night by rising DJ star and trance diva Lil Autotune and hyper-pop duo Terra and Kewu, who released their new album Sugar & Sleaze this year.
If you'd like to find out what musical acts (and other events) await you on each day during the week, be sure to check out the official detailed schedule. But the most crowded, almost like everywhere during similar events, is usually Friday morning and weekend. So what can you expect to start?
Friday belongs to the disco dancers
Friday afternoon at Pride Village with Nora Waacking Inferno (Aug. 11, 6-10 p.m.) has become a festival tradition. Dancers and dancers from the Imperial House of Waacking Czech Chapter, an international dance group founded by Waacking pioneer Tyrone Proctor, will create the club atmosphere of 1970s gay bars in Los Angeles, offering disco, dance performances and a fashion show all in one. They will be accompanied by DJ Cashmeere.
Waacking on the outdoor staging area after 10 p.m. will be seamlessly followed by Pride Discothèque at the Pride Club with DJ Jeffology or DJ Cou.
Saturday 12th August belongs to the liveliest tradition of the festival - the Pride parade from Wenceslas Square to Letná Plain. For ecological reasons, there will be no cars with combustion engines or dancing floats powered by generators running through the city centre. However, the diversity of the parade will be enriched by the presence of the Škoda Enyaq Coupé Respectline, a rainbow electric car whose exterior and interior are decorated with distinctive design elements and the colours of the rainbow on the bonnet point to the importance of protecting human rights, respect for all people and the environment.
This time, the music will be provided by DJs on "sky stations" located on forklifts along the parade route.
Pride Park with six music stalls will be waiting at Letná. The main Rainbow Stage will feature big international names, the Red Stage will showcase the Czech drag and music scene, the Yellow Stage will feature resident DJs from successful queer parties, the Green Stage will focus on Ukrainian techno, the Orange Stage will focus on Roma artists* and the Blue Stage will belong to Czech DJs. The programme will therefore present queer culture in its maximum breadth.
Saturday's programme continues after 10pm with the official Magion Festival afterparty, which takes place in the former 19th century Benedictine convent Gabriel Loci in Smichov. The packed line-up promises big names such as British DJ Kikelomo, whose sets offer a captivating, eclectic mix of house, funk, techno and afrobeat; ND_Baumecker, a representative of the German scene , from the creative duo Barker & Baumecker, who will be accompanied by a house set by São Paulo native and resident of the Brazilian party Mamba Negra Gezender. The Czech Republic will be represented by DJs Nill Garçon, Marie Pravda and Raphael Kosmos.
The atmosphere of live concerts is unrepeatablePhoto: Prague Pride/ Se svolením
On how solid a foundation are our traditions built?
Traditions are an important theme of this year's Prague Pride. The festival points out that many of the firmly-held traditions have in fact only existed for a short time, and conversely LGBT+ people have always been part of society. A number of festival events will explore the theme of tradition. For example, in the discussion Inventing Traditions: the notion of tradition through the lens of social science (10 August, 8pm, Pride House), Zora Hesova from the Faculty of Arts and her guests will explore social norms that do not need to be defended as long as they work. Once they cease to be self-evident, a segment of society tends to explain them away and entangle them in legal norms. One such example is the traditional family.
Similarly, the lecture "Trans Identity as Tradition " (August 11, 5:00 pm, Pride Life) invites to a journey through time and space, showing that the roots of trans identities go back to the very beginnings of human civilizations. It will answer the most common objection, "This didn't happen in our time!"
The tradition of the family and the marital union will be the focus of a taping of the popular podcast Rewrite the History of... Marriage (Aug. 9, 8 p.m. Pride House). This time, historians Martin Groman and Michal Stehlík will focus on how perceptions of the family and the institution of marriage have changed throughout history and how we interpret them today.
In Slovakia, Pride festivals are now held in several cities, although the atmosphere is not as relaxed as we are used to in the Czech Republic. Slovakia's thorny road to the Pride tradition will be presented by the screening of the exceptional documentary film The First Slovak PRIDE with a discussion with its director Roman Stráňai (10 August, 19:00 Pride Life).
The brave organizers of Most Pride Karolína Nodesová, Brno Pride Week Míša Chillová and Slavex Pride Sára Vašičková will advise participants from smaller townshow to start a Pride tradition in your city (9.8. 20:00 Pride House). From Ostrava to Most, there are now local activist initiatives that want to talk about the fact that LGBT+ people do not live only in the capital, but throughout the Czech Republic and everywhere they have the right to feel good and be part of society.
Cultivation and radical transformation is an essential part of queer culture. The ability to conjure new and positive things out of "bad" things will be developed in the workshop "Queering Traditional Ceramics and Glass" (8.8. 15:00 Pride Village).
Shooting Island will offer a wide range of community programming for literally everyone from toddlers to seniors. British premium baby food brand Kendamil has prepared nutritional counseling for children who cannot be breastfed after birth (Aug. 10, 4 p.m. Pride Village). "We don't look at age, appearance, gender or orientation. To us, a parent is anyone who gives care and love to a child. That is why we have become a strategic partner of Prague Pride 2023," says RNDr. Pavel Ježek, Ph.D. (Medical Advisor Health Academy).
Queer identity in the Ukrainian army
Prague Pride will present several interesting exhibitions, which will be on display in the Pride Gallery in the premises of Langhans café in Vodičkova Street. A completely unique one is a set of portraits of LGBTQ veterans of the war in Donbas, which will be presented by Ukrainian photographer Anthon Shebetko under the title We Were There. Most of the queer soldiers are afraid of revealing their identity. Each of them has a different opinion about Pride parades and coming out. The only things that unite them are service in the Ukrainian army, active participation in the volunteer movement, sexuality and gender identity. These topics are still taboo both in typically masculine structures such as the army and in Ukrainian society as a whole.
Rainbow flags will not be flying in the streets this year
The patronage of this year's festival was granted by the Mayor of Prague Bohuslav Svoboda. He thus continued the long tradition of good relations between Prague Pride and the city administration. Prague Pride and the patronage he has granted as mayor of the festival in previous years. Unfortunately, this year the city will not follow up on some of the important symbolic steps that its leadership has stood behind in the past. This year, Prague will not fly rainbow flags in the streets, illuminate the Petřín tower with rainbow colours, or paint the crosswalk on Marianske Square rainbow. There will also be no ceremonial event to raise the rainbow flag on the City Hall building, but the flag itself should be raised.
The Mayor, who is also an ODS MP, recently caused great disappointment with his vote on the constitutional ban on marriage for LGBT+ couples, which is currently being debated in the Chamber of Deputies alongside the enactment of equal marriage. In fact, Bohuslav Svoboda voted in favour of both proposals proceeding to a second reading.
Every individual will stand out at the festivalPhoto: Prague Pride/ Se svolením
"At a joint meeting where the Mayor and I discussed this issue, he gave us an explanation that we can understand from a political point of view, but we remain convinced that he has sent a very negative signal to LGBT+ people, couples and families with children in the Czech Republic. However, we believe that despite some differences of opinion, the Mayor will remain on the side of LGBT+ people, whose equality he supports in many areas," said Prague Pride Festival Director Kamila Fröhlichová.
The festival was also patronized by Czech Interior Minister Vít Rakušan, Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský, Minister for Regional Development Ivan Bartoš, Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic Markéta Pekarová Adamová, Mayor of Prague 1 Terezie Radoměřská and Deputy Mayor of Prague 7 Hana Třeštíková.
Official festival venues
- Pride Village - community programme and music every weekday
- Pride Club - after 10 pm the Village moves to the underground of the island
- Pride House - intellectual nourishment in the form of talks and workshops
- Pride Life - an intergenerational programme bringing together different life experiences
- Pride Gallery - several exhibitions of art from the Czech Republic and abroad
- Pride Cafe - programme in English (not only) for expats and tourists
- Pride Park - the hottest day of the year on Saturday 12 August at Letná
The complete festival programme can be found on the festival website.
Finally, it should be mentioned that you can buy a VIP ticket on goout.net, which gives you the opportunity to enjoy Saturday at Letná in maximum comfort with comfortable seating, your own bar, refreshments and toilets. The ticket includes 5 drinks (beer, wine, soft drinks) and you will be able to buy more conveniently on the spot. Even in the zone, drinks will be served in backed-up returnable cups. For more detailed information on what is available in the VIP zone, please follow the link above.
Partners of this year's Prague Pride are.
The project is implemented with the financial support of the City of Prague, OSF, CNFB, Prague 1 and Culture Ireland. Active Citizen Fund, which supports the LGBT+ Lives Get Better Together project and brings guests and hosts from Norway and Iceland to Prague Pride.
