Amber Heard announces she’s a lesbian, dating photographer Tasya van Ree

Friday night gorgeous actress Amber Heard (from Zombieland, The Informers) went out and proud about her lesbian relationship with photographer Tasya van Ree at GLAAD’s 25th Anniversary Bash.

“I think GLAAD is one of the many reasons that I, as a 24-year-old, can come out. I think that organizations like GLAAD make that possible because if it weren’t for opinions being changed, people being influenced, people being engaged to do the right thing, then there would be no prerogative for anyone to come out. Like I said, I can’t be a part of the problem. I hate the idea of a label just as much as anyone else but I’m with who I’m with, I love who I love and I’m if not a better actress than I was yesterday and my personal life should have no effect on that. I think that the injustice of people staying in the closet is more than I can bear with a clear conscience and I couldn’t sleep at night if I was a part of that problem, if I was part of the lies.”

As a photographer, Tasya works mainly in black-and-white, and often photographs celebrities including Amber. She’s developing a cult following in L.A., and opened an exhibition this August at L.A.’s Celebrity Vault.

She’s openly gay, so her relationship with Amber Heard hasn’t exactly been a secret, but now it’s being proudly shouted from the rooftops. Recently they participated in a protest in West Hollywood against Target’s support of anti-gay political candidates.

This is a sign that, thanks to a few trailblazers and changing tides, it’s becoming far less taboo, or a career killer, to be gay in Hollywood.

Amber gushed about Tasya:

“She is beautiful. I mean, you’d have to be crazy not to want to go out with her!”

In an interview with AfterEllen.com Tasya recently mused about her decision to work mostly with black & white:

“It contains a certain presence; it takes the subject matter and ignites a certain lyrical quality within it that one cannot express in words,” she said. “It dives deep into one’s subconscious and swims around in the thoughts they never knew they had. I love a beautiful black and white photograph because to me, it contains every second of time, wrapped up in one single shot. It evokes in me pleasure, melancholic sensuality, romance and every other human emotion one can think of. There’s a timelessness there, that really moves me, especially in today’s exceedingly fast pace world. There’s a comfort there, a philosophy that can be seen and not heard, a truth that holds my attention. There’s nothing else quite like it.”