50 of the most iconic Pride pictures of the past 25 years displayed in Vondelpark

Since Wednesday, visitors of the Vondelpark in Amsterdam have been able to view fifty of the most remarkable Pride pictures from the past quarter of a century while strolling the park. The photos were curated under the motto “Celebrating Diversity.”

Lucien Spee de Castillo Ruiz, the director of Pride in Amsterdam, reflected on the exhibit with AT5. “For me, this exhibition means a lot of freedom. The entire community is represented”, Spee de Castillo Ruiz said. “Young, old, trans, colored, party, depth, struggle, it has everything. That is what Pride is. Pride is more than the faces people see on the outside."

The winning pictures were selected by a jury led by Cornald Maas out of no fewer than 13 thousand submissions. The exhibition was introduced on Wednesday by Marjolein Moorman, the city alderman for education, poverty and integration. The photos are suspended at a height of about three meters above the ground, and will remain in Vondelpark through August 10.

Jeroen Ploeger was one of the photographers whose image was selected for the exhibition. He captured the moment in which two women were wed in church by a priest. “I think it’s important they are also able to marry in church and get their blessing from a priest. You don’t see that in many other places.”

Yet the fact that LGBTQ+ people still face discrimination in the Netherlands was shown earlier this week when a photo exhibition on same-sex marriage was defaced in the Amsterdam Nieuw-West. One of the pictures included an image of Spee de Castillo Ruiz and his husband. “It is scary, even if it was just a loner”, the Pride director said. “It shows that there are still people who want to frighten us.”