Throughout his many years working at the British Film Institute (BFI) and on its annual LGBTQ+ film festival, my friend and work associate Brian Robinson – who has died of brain cancer aged 67 – was celebrated as a champion of queer cinema. He was also a flamboyant showman who strode on to stages at the BFI Southbank with supreme confidence, establishing mischievous rapport with film-makers and audiences.
Brian joined the BFI in London as a press officer in 1987, in 2000 becoming communications manager for archive and heritage. In the same year, he joined the programming team of the BFI’s London Lesbian & Gay film festival (retitled BFI Flare in 2014), stepping down only in 2024 after being diagnosed with glioblastoma. Over these several decades, he grew as an elder of London’s LGBTQ+ film community and a larger-than-life character with a rich social network.
