Modern queer history: From Pride to community support

Andrej Kuruc arrived in Bratislava as a student who had never met an LGBT person before. He called the helpline from the phone at the dormitory reception desk. A few years later, he co-founded a theater and organized Rainbow Pride.

Romana Schlesinger was one of the founders of modern queer activism in Slovakia. She joined the movement by chance—and within a few months, she was sitting at the same table with people whose books she had only read years earlier. She then organized Slovakia’s first Pride.

Christián Havlíček is a psychologist and a transgender man who spent years building something that was virtually nonexistent in Slovakia—a safe space for transgender and nonbinary people.

Roman Samotný founded Tepláreň. Fifteen years ago, it started as a one-time party focused on queer music; later, it became a bar in downtown Bratislava—and gradually evolved into a place that has become a home for the Slovak LGBTI+ community. This is his story.