Monthly troubles

Have you checked out the Feminist Creative Alliance website yet? Do it! They're a Chicago based group who define feminism as "an activist and non-hierarchical endeavor that challenges intersecting oppressions by confronting mainstream ideologies to bring visibility to the experiences of marginalized groups and individuals". Each month they feature the work of a different artist to further that cause & this month I am very honoured to be their featured trouble-maker (a.k.a. feminist artist) :)

Shiny Shiny Shining!

During my recent trip to Berlin, I met two very ace women from Aus - Melania & Patty.

 

Not only are they lovely & fun & obviously incapable of looking anything less than gorgeous - they also make super music under the name 'Shiny Shiny'. 

 

For one of their gigs they bravely invited me & Melisa to come & do some sort of something while they played.

The 'something' we did consisted of donning fake pubes, smearing each other with lipstick & chucking craft supplies around.  We didn't know what the fuck we were doing.

 

No one knew what the fuck we were doing.

 

It was big fun.

 

Then we tidied up (ourselves, not the room as you can see)

Played some fussball

 

&I decided that Shiny Shiny are one of  my all time favourite groups/couples ever. Ever.

 

& NOW THEY'RE UP FOR AN AWARD!!! One of their film clips - the super cute 'Snakes & Ladders' has been nominated for a National Campus Film Fest Award. So do your ears & eyes a favour & head over to Vimeo to check it out. Watching & 'liking' it will up their chances of winning by a count of one & up your chances of smiling by a count of one hundred.

Beyond Cool

The U.K's Sunday Times has just given 'vag art' the thumbs down in their style section's 'Barometer' column. 'Barometer' is one of those indispensable What's hot?!! What's not?!! guides without which the world would surely come to a grinding halt because OMG! how could we possibly function if we didn't have someone telling us what was the hippest hip hipness of the moment??! We'd have to, like, form our own opinions or some shit! Aiiii! Too terrifying to even contemplate.

 

Apparently feminism's "new fascination" with "our bits" is "gross".

                                                                                              

 

If some unfortunate woman (I'm assuming it's a woman based on the "our bits" statement) is so consumed with self loathing that she finds parts of her own body "gross" all I can feel is pity. That PLUS she's stuck writing a goddamn hot&not column - I'm hesitant to be too critical 'cause she obviously doesn't have much to live for. However, she directly slagged off an awesome project - Embroideries: a campaign to end female genital mutilation, who have been doing wonderful work putting together a beautiful quilt of cunts to draw attention to this horrific practise. When since has campaigning against FGM been a fucking style issue? 

Uncool, Sunday Times, very uncool.

If you, or someone you know, write a 'hot or not' column or find your bits "gross" please contact Beyond Blue for depression counselling & SHUT THE FUCK UP.

I wanna be a cyborg too!

Meet my latest cyber-crush Ms. Hiromi Ozaki a.k.a Sputniko! Watch 'till the end to see some space-baby blasting gloriousness.



Too delightful for words.

I think I've finally figured out my sexuality

I only like sleeping with feminists. Is there a word for that?

Mainstream Medusa

We all know that if you watch too much mainstream media your brain will go numb & very soon your entire body will turn to stone.
But for a short time you're gonna get impunity from this terrible fate & are encouraged to watch 'cause I am on it! Briefly.

& actually, it's ABC TV & Radio National which I'm on. Hardly 'mainstream'. More like side-streams, little puddly brooks which aren't nearly so polluted but which not many people bother swimming in either. In fact, they're far enough out of the way that you can go skinny dipping in them, which is exactly what I did. Yes - cunts out in the media.

Each of the programs which include meeeeee aired a week or two ago but both are downloadable from the net.

1st up is Making It Handmade - the doco about subversive craft made by Anna Brownfield. Featuring crafters, my partner at Craft Cartel Rayna Fahey, Gemma Jones, Pip Lincolne & me, it first screened at Melbourne International Film Festival last year & made it's smallscreen debut on ABC2 on August 15. You can still view it here on iview, but only for a few more days I think so get lookin.

When you're through looking, have a listen to this radio feature on yarnbombing by Suzanne Donisthorpe, made for Radio National's Artworks program. Mine is the voice which sounds like it belongs to a 12 year old near the end.

And if you're still marvelling at how a 32 year old woman can keep her vocal chords so young (I spread Oil of Olay on my toast!), have a listen to the piece I did with Nicole Hurtubise for 'People's Tours', a brainchild of Jane Curtis. You can download it from the People's Tours webpage here, or from the 3CR radio station here (along with tours of rollerderby, women's pool comps, the Aboriginal history of Gertrude st & Yana Alana's take on rage).

Is non-reproductive sex natural & wondrous? Is the Pope Catholic?

I have recently returned from an epic cunt pilgrimage. I actually re-routed my entire European trip & added Rome in to the itinerary specifically for this pilgrimage because I am a true believer.

In Cunts I Trust.

The destination was Vatican City, the Basilica. A place of grand & majestic beauty...


awe-inspiring ....



& eerily cunt-free....


Even the little girl cherubs had to cover their bits up while the little boy cherubs dangled free. Weird. Obviously the Basilica was in urgent need of some pussifying. Which is where I came in.

I lovingly constructed a pair of cunts...


With lesbian love motifs...




I then attached heels to the backs...















& strung them together.


Normally I would fling the cunts up over power lines, referencing the running shoes flung up by gangs to claim their territory, as my own way of reclaiming the streets for women. But for my lesbian-love cunts I had something loftier in mind. I had my eyes set on the Basilica.


I was quite nervous 'cause I'd never been to Vatican City before. There were approximately 1 kazillion tourists, nuns, priests & coppers shuffling about & numerous bag-checks to get through before I could get access to the dome. With all of that plus the Wrath Of God hovering in the air I felt quietly terrified. So I knew it was a good thing to do.

In Australia same-sex couples still can't legally say 'I do' to each other, in most states they can't jointly adopt & it is legal for faith-based organisations to discriminate against people based on their gender or sexuality. I personally know people who work in Catholic organisations who conceal and lie about their sexuality because of fear of losing their jobs. This is incredibly fucked-up.

Massive beauty becomes hideously ugly when it tramples on small & fragile beauty such as the love between two people of the same gender. So, I set out to climb the dome, & gift the Basilica with my Lesbian-Love Cunts.

It took hours to get through the cues & the security checks & the narrow spiraling staircase in the upper-dome was choccas with tourists & lined with security cameras but I managed to duck to the side for a moment...


pretend I was fascinated with the meshing on one of the windows, push it out a little...

& let the lesbian cunt love fly


Unfortunately the window I shoved them out of faced onto a part of Vatican City closed off to plebs so I had to go way outside the walls of the city to get some photos...


You can just make them out, glinting in the afternoon sun.

It's a pity I couldn't get a closer shot but in a way I like the idea of the Lesbian Love-Cunts having a private viewing with the Pope & his cronies. I do, I do, I do.