TEDRA

Smoke Break, 2006

Collage and mixed media on paper

9 × 12 in.

Pray the Gay Away is an original mixed-media collage on paper that confronts the harmful pressure to suppress queer identity in the name of faith and conformity. The piece displays a Black woman in a prayer pose sitting in a church that feels void of life.

Through hand-drawn interiors, patterned textiles, and a figure caught in a private moment of prayer, the work holds space for vulnerability, resistance, and self-acceptance.