“Fire Island is a very special place, especially for queer people,” Jimi Urquiaga, a.k.a. Missleidy Rodriguez, told me. While that might seem like a statement of the obvious, Urquiaga has experienced the island from an atypical vantage point: for the past two summers, they've been packing up their life in New York City as a costume designer, producer, creative director and drag queen to come work at the Pines’ plant shop, CAMP. Urquiaga called me on their break, sitting behind a desk at the plant shop, with a view overlooking the bay. “So that’s the fantasy,” they said with a laugh after describing their surroundings.
For the most part, though, Fire Island has been a fantasy for the whitest, wealthiest, and fittest members of the LGBTQ+ community. And in looking back through archival photos, Urquiaga said they've rarely spotted people of color, with the exception of legendary DJ Lina Bradford. While an exclusionary environment on Fire Island certainly exists, Urquiaga estimates that 95% of their coworkers are people of color (per their own estimate). And after a particularly special season working on the island, which they described as “adult summer camp,” they wanted to attempt to correct that archival erasure. The resulting photo essay, “The Pines Summer of ‘23,” exists as a time capsule of a magical summer shared with their coworkers-turned-second family.
Fire Island is near and dear to Urquiaga’s heart, in part because of its natural beauty, but moreover because of the people who come there. “We put our lives on hold and come out here to experience it and take away whatever we want,” they told me. “You get all of these different personalities together, you have this life on an island, and it’s like you're kind of on a paid vacation. My coworkers, they all bring something that makes them special and makes the experience special.”
For the series, Urquiaga collaborated with photographer Carmen DeCristo, who this summer became the first trans woman to exhibit work in the Fire Island Pines Biennial Art Show. Though they took some inspiration from photographers like Helmut Newton, Urquiaga’s main inspiration was DeCristo’s work. “There's all these different iconic buildings and locations, and I felt like she would capture it beautifully in a lens that we probably haven't seen before,” they said. The duo certainly succeeded in that regard, a feat that’s all the more impressive when you consider the fact that the images were all shot over the course of a single day.
Most importantly, though, Urquiaga succeeds in honoring the people who keep Fire Island afloat. “We are on this island and we do create the culture that people come and experience," said Urquiaga. "[In this series] we are taking up space and at the same time being celebrated."
