Even after the UK 1967 Sexual Offences Act repealed automatic criminalisation for same-sex intercourse, public rhetoric suggested homosexuality was an aberration and an affliction rather than an identity.

The Gay Liberation Front, founded in a basement room of the London School of Economics in 1970, challenged these beliefs and the once-held assumption that all homosexuals are inherently predatory.

The series marks 50 years since the founding of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) in the UK and the beginning of the modern LGBT+ rights movement. The series is comprised of three large format digital billboards plus a special six-billboard installation.

The artist’s text is a play on a protest placard made by human rights campaigner (and former GLF member) Peter Tatchell for 1973’s London Gay Pride.

In conversation with the artist, Tatchell recalled: 'I thought turn it on its head: people think gays are revolting; no, no, we are REVOLTING! We’re fighting back, you know.'

Five decades later, Firrell responded with reflecting the truth that homosexuality is still regarded as intolerable by some and many LGBT+ people around the world are still struggling for acceptance, security and equality.

At the time of writing, 77 countries still criminalise private, consensual same-sex relationships. These discriminatory laws put LGBT+ people at risk - at the risk of blackmail, arrest, prosecution, imprisonment and, in at least five countries, death by execution.

quotes visually from the work of the German photographer Wilhelm von Gloeden (1856-1931), one of the first photographers to create openly erotic and, in particular, homoerotic nudes.

Von Gloeden’s images of young Sicilian men, often in classical poses evoking gods or as Pan-like fawns, became hugely popular making him one of the first purveyors of gay erotica to the European demi-monde.

He paid particular attention to the fall of the light and even formulated makeup with milk, olive oil, and glycerin to enhance his models’ skin.

(Von Gloeden rarely photographed women so Firrell also turned to Victorian erotic postcards for images that were, or could be inferred to be, lesbian.)

The artist recolourised these found images creating a unified series of vermillion and rose erotica: 'I took the decision to present these artworks in rich pink/red wine/scarlet tones: bordello colours if you like. I felt this reflected the 'juicy' or 'saucy' humour of many past GLF protests in which men dressed as nuns and then kissed each other or carried a 15ft long papier maché cucumber to confront and embarrass hypocritical polite society.’

The artist’s large-format digital billboards celebrated the bravery of the original GLF members but also served to stress that the struggle for full equality is not yet over.

repurposes a male nude by Baron Wilhelm von Gloeden photographed c. 1890.

The image is unusual in von Gloeden's body of work because it was created in a photographic studio not as his most famous Sicilian pictures were. This gives the image a slightly selfconscious, studied quality.

The man's moustache suggests a red-blooded masculinity, but his body pose tends to contradict that identity. He is posed in a formal way more usually associated with the female nude. The inclusion of leopard skin and the luscious pink/red re-colouring of the image further enhance this 'mixed messaging' conveying a subliminal impression of bisexuality.