::: I Look Up to the Sky Now :::

Youth Enrichment Services (YES) is a program of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center. Founded in 1989, YES was established to end isolation for LGBTQ youth through activity-based programming, recreation, support groups and peer leadership in an alcohol and drug-free setting. YES has expanded into an integrated, holistic empowerment program that supports the creation of vibrant youth culture through the creative arts, community-building and peer education initiatives, including training for student leaders and youth activists, and an annual summer camp program. YES provides free and confidential services including crisis prevention, information and referral, short-term counseling and support, HIV prevention and education, and advocacy. In addition, YES staff provide workshops for students and youth groups, as well as professional development trainings for staff, on topics related to diversity, violence prevention, gender and sexual identity formation, HIV prevention and sexual health.

"Have I experienced any changes since I've been involved in the community? Yeah, I have. I no longer walk with my head down. That's something I'm very proud of. I look up to the sky now." ---Dexter Asido, YES participant and artist

I Look Up to the Sky Now is about celebration.
It is about celebrating a community of queer young people,
Who have come together to make art,
Whose activism is art;
Whose art is activism
Who are building a community that is based in an ethic of inclusion, respect, and love;

I Look Up to the Sky Now is 11 self-portraits;
It is about Teaspoon, Andy Monk, Sara Wekselblatt, Jenn Butler, Anna Goldsnyczer, An-d, Jon Salvatore, Suraby Yensi, Kevin Santos, Dexter Asido, Philip Bienenfeld and P creating filmic language that tells their stories, their histories;
It is about self-definition, self-representation, and the documenting of young queer lives;
It is about celebrating our identities, overcoming adversity, busting through the constraints of homophobia, racism, sexism, classism, ageism, gender
And making art together, that grows ourselves and our community.
It is about growing hope.

I Look Up to the Sky Now is a 60 minute documentary mosaic that is full of humor, passion, and pathos.
It is set against the backdrop of the YES program that has provided a home for hundreds and hundreds of queer young people to come together to make art, to make community, to re-make themselves;
It is a mosaic that pieces together part of the legacy of queer youth culture.

I Look Up to the Sky Now is about looking at ourselves and imagining ourselves, our lives beyond the immediate circumstances we see;
it is about imagining possibility;
and the transformation possible when we support each other
To grow ourselves, our visions, our lives.

To see---
To perceive by the eye
To form a mental picture of
To imagine as a possibility

I Look Up to the Sky Now is a 60 minute documentary directed by Barbara M. Bickart; produced by Barbara M. Bickart and Miriam Yeung. Bickart and twelve young artists, activists and leaders from the YES program of New York City's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center have collaborated over the past two years to make this experimental documentary that interweaves their twelve self-portraits together with footage of events in the queer youth community over the past several years. It is a celebration of the vibrant, resilient community these young people are building together with adult allies, despite the odds stacked up against them.