Opening Weekend

The weekend of October 20th was indeed momentous for the women of our show. Everything we have been working toward day and night, came to a climax this past weekend. The opening, on Thursday night, went extremely well and our turn out was better than we could have imagined, filling the space from 6:15pm and on. Friends, family, teachers, peers, mentors, and future friends showed their support in great numbers. Our 5for5 event Friday night was inspiring and made way for an intimate discussion on matters of importance today, led by LMU faculty and students.

We would like to thank everyone who came to the opening reception and 5for5, for their much appreciated support. The success of Womynhouse would not have been possible without you! The evening was not only a fun celebration, but a remarkable and memorable experience for all of the women in our show.

Though the opening came and went in the blink of an eye, there are still exciting events yet to take place. We are grateful to have the show up until November 11th, and we plan to utilize the space as much as we can during this time through evenings dedicated to the spoken word, performance, and celebration. We encourage you to visit and revisit our house while the show is up and to spread the word to women and men alike.

One of the great hopes that has been born through Womynhouse, is that our cause will be continued beyond the show, and that we will get more artists and people who want to create, to join us in sharing stories and expressions.

We are all very excited to share with you...drumroll please...these photos of the opening.

Thank you!

What A Weekend! Installation.

We had a busy busy weekend at the gallery. I will let the pictures do most of the talking. Here's a taste of our show in its beginning stages of installation. Remember these photos when you come to the gallery for our opening and the following events! The weekend was great fun. Thursday is approaching quickly, and the excitement is flowing through us and the space. We're trying to savor every moment.

Installing the Walls

Lisa adding the final touches to her painting

Erin and Kenzie installing their interactive piece

Messy!

Amanda's Looking Like a Boss

Strange mist after a crazy hot day!

Working Ladies

Amanda C's Hard Work

Dinner Break! Thanks Amanda D.

Elise and Lisa Installing

The Girls <3

Roar Network Interviews Our Womyn

LMU's TV network interviewed Erin (pictured), Kenzie, and Amanda C about Womynhouse over the weekend in the student gallery, where our show will be presented. The segment will air next week.

Stay tuned for more exciting updates and events.

Where's the Ladies' Room?

Kenzie and Erin are working on an installation, in which they will actually build an interactive bathroom stall in our art space. Here's a sneak peak at the materials they have stored in their backyard at the moment. Come see the exhibit for the final product!

The Official Womynhouse Flyer

We are excited to share with you...drumroll please...the official Womynhouse Flyer. Special thanks to Erin Mallea, who created this original design! Also, thank you to Kelsey Fugere, for use of her photograph.

Please spread the word! The show is only a little more than one month away.

Rae Linda Brown

Thank you to Rae Linda Brown, VP of Education at Loyola Marymount University for her generous gift of $500.00 to the Womynhouse project. We are so gracious for your contribution and we look forward to meeting you soon!

love,

the ladies of Womynhouse

Womynhouse Begins

“A wish for otherness.  A space in which you are surrounded by an entirely different world aura, transcending the established plane”.[i] (Judy, Catalogue)

From October 16 to November 11, 2011, thirteen female Loyola Marymount University painters, photographers, performers, writers, and historians will gather forty years later to present our very own Womynhouse.  The Thomas P. Kelly student art gallery will become the site for our own explorations of all things art: installations, spoken word, performances, films, mixed media, poetry, prose, and the uncategorized.  The space will become our sanctuary to practice, interact, debate, philosophize, and engage with ourself, each other, and the viewer.  Using the Southern California Feminist movement that swept across the 1970s as our guide, Womynhouse will not only become the first all-female show at LMU, but it will also cross boundaries by giving voices to a group of passionate and talented students who are interested in spreading this language to the rest of the LMU community with frank vulnerability on pressing female issues today.  

In 1972, Judy Chicago and Miriam Schapiro started the Feminist Art Program where they went on to create the Womanhouse project with their students.[i] The purpose of the Feminist Art Program at Cal Arts was to "help women 
restructure their personalities to be more consistent with their desires to be 
artists and to help them build their art making out of their experiences as
women”.[ii]  Using this as our main inspiration, we will be channeling and pumping this inherent female energy into our own projects with a focus on the contemporary gender issues we see in 2011. Some of these themes and ideas will criss-cross and overlap with those of the 1970 Cal Art students yet we hope to bring our own stories, struggles, and celebrations to our peers here at LMU. Although our own project will be taking place in an institutional setting, the ideas and concepts are still genuine, honest interpretations that are happening to females in a Southern California university in 2011. The original 1972 Womanhouse project stems from deep academic roots; it simply could not have existed without the support of the educational system.  Similar to our Feminist foremothers, we cannot exist without the support of our own university.  

Womanhouse at Cal Arts shows the “pivotal role of the institution in nurturing the artistic legacy of Los Angeles” by providing an experiment “in considering institutional boundaries, social context, and critique”.[i]  In conjunction with Pacific Standard Time, a collaboration taking place in over 60 institutions across Southern California, the Womynhouse project will allow our own LMU community to participate in the celebration and honoring of the "birth of the L.A. art scene." http://pacificstandardtime.org/ 

Womynhouse will become the opportunity to expose both our campus and our talented art students to the rest of the LA community.  Through collaborative forces, our hopes are to generate a campus-wide discussion that invites both men and women to understand the teachings of what it means to be a Feminist through all things art. If you are interested in supporting us! Please email Acourtne@lion.lmu.edu. 

Thank you,

Amanda Courtney 

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[i] McFadden, Jane, “Los Angeles: Then and Now, Here and There”, LA Artland (London: Black Dog Publishing, 2005), 46. 

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[i] Joselit, David.American Art Since 1945 (London: Thames & Hudson, 2003), 180. 

[ii] Schapiro, Miriam. Shaping the Fragments of Art and Life. (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999), 10.

   

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[i] Chicago, Judy and Miriam Schapiro. "Womanhouse" (Valencia, CA: California Institute
of the Arts, 1971.)