Gash! At The Rio Cinema

Gash! At The Rio Cinema A celebration of underground culture, nightlife and community, raising funds for our beloved Rio. After our brilliant first edition, we’re back with the next installment of your favourite subversive cinema takeover. Proceeds from the event will go to keeping the doors open of this invaluable cultural institution, while continuing to support The Rio’s legacy of transgressive and innovative arts programming. We’ll be exploring influential subcultures born as counter-cultural movements, challenging discontent and authority through music and creativity. This edition will focus on a legacy of powerful women in underground scenes, while highlighting the symbiotic intersections between Goth, Body Music and Fetish nightlife in the UK. With DJs in Screen One and at the bar, underground music documentaries on Screen Two, a photography exhibition sprawling through the corridors and foyer, featuring the Bishopsgate Institute’s iconic archive of fetish subculture, an exhibition of images from the Mott Collection’s new release on Cultural Traffic, “Prelude: Transgression in the UK”, as well as a special screening of forgotten fetish film kindly curated by Content Warning. Stage Invasion! Our DJs and dancers will take over the Screen One stage. A host of London’s darkest and most deadly femmes, to soundtrack this evening of subversive pleasures. A beacon, an icon, endless glamour from The Blitz to now, hrh PRINCESS JULIA Music to hold you very close, playing Body Music from Fabric to Fold, FAUX NAÏF Our queen of the night, founder of HTBX, and Industrial Techno dreamgirl BECKY STROKE Deep dark and hypnotic Techno, a touch from the hand of TSUNIMAN Smoke machines and leather, gothic soundscapes from Synthicide resident, LESS THAN HUMAN + The Gash! Residents and more, playing a black rainbow of EBM, Goth, Coldwave and Techno all night long. — For our visuals for the evening, we’re welcoming two incredible underground archives, exhibiting slides, flyers, photos and more: From the Bishopsgate Institute, The UK Leather and Fetish Archive is dedicated to documenting and celebrating the history and heritage of the leather, rubber, kink, BDSM and fetish community in the UK. The archive started in 2016 with the deposit of the records of numerous gay/bi male UK leather clubs and has since expanded to hold the archives of organisations, clubs and individuals of all sexualities, gender identities and kink persuasions. They also hold an extensive collection of books, pamphlets and magazines documenting UK fetish history from the early 1900s to the present day. As well as a special preview of images courtesy of The Mott Collection, Cultural Traffic presents PRELUDE: Transgression In The UK, by Toby Mott. This visual archive explores the UK’s fetish and transgressive scenes from the 1980s onwards. The book includes pre-internet items, club flyers, posters, and fashion catalogues, documenting this underground movement. — For our late late night cinema on screen two, we’ll be hosting a special screening by Content Warning, fresh from their recent events at The ICA and The Rio. BIZARRE & BRITISH: Femmes of Fetish From underground Fetish 8mm films smuggled through Soho’s back rooms to gritty VHS erotica, we present scenes that display the discipline, desire, and defiance of British femmes in porn. Often illegal, clandestine, and challenging to mainstream values, these pornographic representations stand as testimony to British fetish culture and its history. This screening features digitised versions of rare erotic footage from the UK Fetish Archive, spanning a period from the ‘70s to the early ‘00s. Expect the unexpected with scenes of bullwhips, boxing, Femme Dommes, and more - offering a raw and unfiltered glimpse into a cinematic world where women command our attention. Content Warning: nudity, pornographic depictions, impact play, bondage, BDSM, verbal humiliation Content Warning is a curatorial duo - Helena Whittingham and Harlan Whittingham - who are dedicated fetishists and curators with a passion for exploring fetish culture. Together they run the Late Tapes series, a regular screening programme at the ICA in collaboration with the UK Fetish Archive. Alongside this archival project, they also curate screenings of contemporary queer and fetish film, most recently as part of the London Short Film Festival. + More screenings TBA.Music, Punk, Goth, Fetish Subculture, Fashion, ArtPT5H182025-04-05Gash! At The Rio Cinema"Gash! At The Rio Cinema"

Showtimes

April 5, 11:00 pm