GAZE's organisers seek out educational and entertaining LGBT cinema which members of the Dublin gay community may not have had the opportunity to view elsewhere. The programme also includes films by gay artists which don't contain gay themes, and films which have inspired or are inspired by gay artists.
History
The festival began life as the Lesbian and Gay Film Festival in 1992, founded by Yvonne O'Reilly and Kevin Sexton, and was held in the Irish Film Centre. Over 3,500 people attended in 2006, the last year before the rebranding as GAZE. The Dublin Lesbian and Gay Film Festival was renamed GAZE in 2007. Over 4,000 people attended the 2007 festival, the fifteenth edition. In 2007, the festival acquired a new director in Michele Devlin, the programmer of the Belfast Film Festival. An updated version of The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, with the story set in New York in the 1980s, was one of the programme's highlights. The 2008 event, the sixteenth edition, lasted from 31 July until 4 August and included screenings at Dublin's Project Arts Centre and the Winding Stair, alongside its usual venue the Irish Film Institute. GAZE 2009, the seventeenth festival, took place over five days at the Light House Cinema in Smithfield from 30 July until 3 August. An HBO remake of the classic documentary Grey Gardens, starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, received its European premiere when it opened the festival on 30 July. Over sixty-seven films, including premieres, documentaries and shorts were featured at the event. GAZE's 23rd programme of features was announced on July 25, 2015, with screenings taking place from July 30 to August 3 at the Light House Cinema. In 2017, the Gaze Film Festival celebrated its 25th year of sharing movies, documentaries, and short films about the LGBTQ community. The 25th GAZE programme took place at the Light House Cinema from 3 August to 7 August 2017. The festival kicked off with the world premiere screening of documentary, telling the story of the quarter-century fight for – and achievement of – a transformation in Irish society's relationship to its LGBT members that was participated in by the LGBT community, including GAZE – one that culminated in the 2015 Irish Marriage Referendum. Almost 12,000 people were expected to attend the 2017 festival event.
