LGBT_SLO_1984

What is straight? A line can be straight, or a street, but the human heart, oh, no, it’s curved like a road through mountains. – Tennessee Williams Suzana Tratnik and Brane Mozetič are writers, translators, publicists, and long-time LGBT activists. They introduce us to the history of the LGBT movement in Slovenia through the Ljubljana LGBT Walk Tour. We begin in front of the venue where the Gay Culture Festival Magnus was organised in 1984 in ŠKUC, Ljubljana, which included the LGBT Film Festival – the first LGBT film festival in Europe. In the same year, the so-called “Magnus Section” – the first organised gay movement in the former Yugoslavia and probably in Eastern Europe as well – was established in the context of the ŠKUC-Forum, which brought together various alternative and civil social movements at the time. The first years were characterised by club events (the only of their kind in the former Yugoslavia) and the organisation of events and festivals. The Slovenian LGBT movement became the most progressive movement of that time and is still active today through different forms and organisations.