New art exhibit turns Coral Gables church into gallery for LGBTQ visibility
What happens when a place long associated with shame for the LGBTQ+ community becomes the backdrop for unapologetic queer visibility?
It’s a question local artist and director David Gary Lloyd is asking people to ponder in a new art exhibit hosted at Coral Gables United Church of Christ — a progressive Christian church with a long history of welcoming those that have often felt rejected by organized religion.
Opening Thursday, “The Reach of Light” incorporates religious iconography — references to halos, baptisms and resurrections — and includes original work from a host of local LGBTQ+ artists, including Lloyd, who helped curate the exhibit. The goal of the show, which is produced in partnership with networking group “Gay in the Gables,” is to expand queer visibility and foster dialogue between two communities that are normally “pitted against” each other, Lloyd said.
“There’s a spectrum of spirituality and queerness in this show. I really wanted it to feel very humanity based,” Lloyd said.
By including art that invoke queerness — an image of a trans person posing proudly after top surgery and a video of a drag performance filmed in the same church — Lloyd said he wants people to walk away gaining a deeper understanding of the LGBTQ+ community.
“The takeaway I want from the show is for people to feel like they can embrace the queer community. It’s not a community that needs to be feared,” he said.
Among the artists featured in the show are Florida photographer Josh Aronson, Celeste Burns, Ricky Cohete, Michael Zimmerer and Juicy Love Dion — an R-House drag queen who competed on Ru Paul’s Drag Race, and recently shot a music video inside the church’s sanctuary.
Lloyd points to work from Aronson’s collection “Florida Boys” as an example of art that plays with the idea of gender identity while incorporating elements of nature and spirituality.
In a piece called “Christlike” three boys are depicted playing on a Florida beach and one boy looks as if he’s on a cross.
“It looks like he’s almost being drowned — so there’s this very interesting dialogue there with childhood and religion,” he said.
Part of Lloyd’s inspiration for the show came from his experience as an openly gay artist himself.
Last year, Lloyd was commissioned for a solo show at a well-known real estate development office in Coral Gables, which he said was later censored. The art show paired portraits of animals that exhibit same-sex behaviors, like peacocks and flamingos, and was meant to be a commentary on how queerness has been hidden throughout history, leaving artists to use symbolism to communicate their point of view. After some of the building’s tenants complained, Lloyd said he had to physically cover up some of the art — a move that he said further highlighted the point of the exhibit.
“That made me realize how essential queer visibility really is, especially here in Florida,” Lloyd said.
At a time when Florida legislation has targeted the LGBTQ+ community, Lloyd said his show is meant to be a reminder that queer presence has always existed, despite centuries of societal resistance.
“Queer people have always been here. We’ve been contributing to even religious institutions for centuries,” Lloyd said.
Queer art ‘on full display’
When “Gay in the Gables” founder Steven Littlehale heard about Lloyd’s solo exhibit getting censored in the Gables last year, he felt inspired to help.
“This burning just ignited within me, and it was like, okay, gloves are off. That’s not acceptable,” he said. “ I can’t live in a community and not say something about that.”
Littlehale launched the social networking group “Gay in the Gables” in 2025 as an effort to create more public spaces for the LGBTQ community in Coral Gables, a place that he says has a vibrant gay community, but not many gatherings aimed at fostering meaningful connection between members.
After seeing Lloyd’s art and the artists he curated for the exhibition, Littlehale said hosting the show at a local, historic church was a “perfect response” to the censorship incident that happened last year.
“We’re going back into this not only sacred space but historic sacred space in Coral Gables, and we’re on full display for everyone to experience what this very unique expression of spirituality looks like,” Littlehale said.
Littlehale knew from firsthand experience that Coral Gables UCC would welcome the exhibition with open arms.
Littlehale’s late husband Howard, who was a rabbi and longtime activist for same-sex marriage equality, had a close friendship with Gables UCC senior pastor Laurie Hafner. Members of Hafner’s church often credit her leadership as being key to cultivating a church known for its inclusiveness that welcomes all people — no matter their background.
The church itself has been a hub for community and worship since it was established by George Merrick — the founder of Coral Gables — in 1923, and belongs to the United Church of Christ, a denomination with 1.6 million members in the U.S.
It’s always been a forward-thinking denomination. The United Church of Christ was the first to ordain a woman and an openly gay man. It was the first denomination to take a stand against slavery in 1700, and the first to ordain an African American person in 1785. Keeping up with that tradition, Gables UCC was the first congregation to have a float in the Pride Parade in Miami Beach over 15 years ago, an action that contributed to the church’s significant LGBTQ population today.
Hafner said that welcoming The Reach of Light exhibit is a part of the church’s calling.
“These works of art reveal LGBTQ+ spirituality, identity, and resilience not as something outside the sacred, but as one of the ways God’s light shines in our world,” Hafner told the Miami Herald. “ A truly welcoming church doesn’t just tolerate difference; it celebrates it.”
The show doesn’t shy away from the elephant in the room. Lloyd said he had many conversations with people from different religions — Mormons, Catholics and Jews — whose queer identity was suppressed at the expense of spirituality.
“I’ve seen many gay individuals that have struggled … because a part of them might be Catholic, and that is part of their identity, but there’s also part of that religion that’s telling them that they’re sinful and that they’re wrong,” he said.
The identity struggle can create mental health issues and has caused many to leave organized religion altogether. But ultimately, Lloyd said the exhibit acts as a blueprint for a world where both queerness and spirituality can coexist.
Although he feels that religion has, in many ways, rejected the LGBTQ community, Littlehale said there are also religious communities — like Hafner’s church — that have shown up for queer folks.
He said the show can help people “realize they have this resource, they have a part of them that they don’t need to cut off, that it can be celebrated, be it in a religious institution or not.”
If you go:
WHAT: Pride Art Exhibition “The Reach of Light”
WHEN: Opening Reception: 6-9 p.m. June. Open June 4–7
WHERE: Coral Gables United Church of Christ, 3010 Desoto Blvd., Coral Gables
COST: Free
INFORMATION: Eventbrite or gablesucc.org/event/the-reach-of-light-art-exhibit/
This story was produced with financial support from Trish and Dan Bell and donors in South Florida’s Jewish and Muslim communities, including Khalid and Diana Mirza and the Mohsin and Fauzia Jaffer Foundation, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners. The Miami Herald maintains full editorial control of this work.
This story was originally published June 4, 2026 at 5:34 PM.
