Kitchener artist’s scrapped GRT Pride bus design now part of Indigenous community centre exhibit

A Kitchener artist’s work will finally be on display after it was sidelined by design disagreement with Grand River Transit. CTV’s Spencer Turcotte explains.

A Pride Month bus wrap, which was scrapped because of design disagreements with Grand River Transit (GRT), will now be showcased at an upcoming exhibit.

Logan Soeder of Kitchener was chosen to create the bus wrap in 2024, an opportunity GRT has been offering to local creatives for the last few years.

The queer artist said the design was a memorial to a friend who was part of the LGBTQ2S+ community.

Soeder also drew inspiration from communities at the heart of global conflicts. At the time, the war in Gaza had been underway for more than seven months. Soeder felt that was even more reason to have it reflected as an element in the design. GRT felt otherwise.

“I just didn’t feel surprised,” Soeder said, in response to the design being scrapped. “Their reasoning was I had put a Palestinian activist on the art and the ‘Land Back’ [shirt].”

In May 2024, CTV News asked GRT to comment on the design disagreements. Those specific questions weren’t answered and the Pride Month bus rolled out without Soeder’s design.

“Why not? I mean, there’s queer Palestinians out there. There’s the two-spirit person on the bus. I felt that is part of the LGBTQ communities,” Soeder explained.

The artist wasn’t willing to give up. Soeder went to Willow River Centre, a local Indigenous hub, for help on how to share the piece with the public.

“I know what it feels like – to have that erasure take place of visible, racialized, Indigenous, queer people,” said Bangishimo, an artist and co-director of the Willow River Centre.

They gave Soeder the opportunity to display the design as part of a new exhibit.

“Because with June being Pride Month and National Indigenous Peoples Month, and then knowing that one of the people portrayed in Logan’s design was a two-spirit trans person, we obviously had to speak up about that,” Bangishimo said.

Now on a cloth-like material, the artwork and message are proudly on display.

“It’s almost like it was just meant to be this way and I’m able to share it with the Indigenous community,” said Soeder.

The exhibit opens Friday evening and continues until the end of April.