“Navigating Sex Work Spaces: COVID-19 and Beyond” is a community-led participatory action research project with sex workers in Metro Vancouver conducted from 2020-2025.
Emerging from collaborations between the AESHA Project, PACE Society, WISH Drop-In Centre Society, and Kingsway Community Station, this project aims to showcase the nuanced experiences of diverse sex workers with the goal of increasing sex worker visibility and delineating pathways beyond criminalization.
Through photography, mixed media, sculpture, and written word, artists offer critical insights into the structural forces shaping their lives — exclusion from social and labour protections, the toxic unregulated drug supply, intersecting forms of criminalization, housing insecurity, and the ongoing impacts of colonization and systemic stigma.
“Adventures in Sex Work” Documentary
During the spring and summer of 2024, the research team, community advisory team members, and participants worked with a local filmmaking non-profit, the Cinematheque, to produce a short documentary, “Adventures in Sex Work.”
Combining two of our project goals — to challenge sex work stigma through public-facing art, and to build capacity for creative practice among our community — we produced a documentary film that captures artists’ experiences and reflections on the project and their visions of future impact.
Our Hustle, Our Struggle, Our Art – An art exhibit by sex workers
In June 2025, we hosted our culminating knowledge mobilization event, an art exhibition and community workshop. The arts-based submissions were displayed in a local gallery space, and open to the public for an entire week. The opening reception was attended by over 100 community members, including media representatives and local policymakers for the biggest possible impact.
We also published and distributed a free catalogue which includes all of the artworks displayed in the gallery.
Acknowledgement
This project was supported by the Vancouver Foundation and the Canada Foundation for Innovation.
