Today, the city of Boston will officially proclaim April 9 as “Riot Grrrl” day, in honor of original riot grrrl, musician Kathleen Hanna. Hanna, a pivotal figure on the hardcore-punk scene and frontwoman of seminal feminist bands Bikini Kill and Le Tigre, is in Boston to lecture and perform at the Wilbur Theater.
The Riot Grrrl movement has been at the center of another celebration—this one, artistic in nature—that explores its legacy and its influence on art and politics.
Curated by former Riot Grrrls Astria Suparak and Ceci Moss, Alien She is a touring exhibit now on view at the Orange County Museum of Art, that celebrates the legacy of the Riot Grrrl movement and its relationship to art.
Alien She features works from seven contemporary artists: Ginger Brooks Takahashi, Tammy Rae Carland, Miranda July, Faythe Levine, Allyson Mitchell, L.J. Roberts and Stephanie Syjuco, whose work has, in various different ways, been informed by the Riot Grrrl movement between 1991 and the present. Each of these artists has taken cue from their own relationship to “Riot Grrrl” and its multiple manifestations through art and politics and created work that reflects such experience.
Through archival materials sourced from the dumba collective, the EMP Museum in Seattle Jabberjaw, the Riot Grrrl Collection at the Fales Library & Special Collections and many personal collections, Alien She explores the meaning of the Riot Grrrls founding ethos, which has come to symbolize female empowerment, ideological collaboration and DIY ethics. It does so through two curated artworks as well as an extensive “archival section” that includes crowd-sourced fanzines, cassettes, playlists, video interviews and posters.
The curators have, though aware of the political statement that such an exhibit might be interpreted as making, strayed from historicizing the Riot Grrl movement, instead aiming to present it as a “living entity” and a “labor of love.” This is the reason why the archival collection is a scattered amalgam of hundreds of collected “evidence”, rather than a chronologically organized journey through the Riot Grrl movement.
Nonetheless, the beating heart of Riot Grrrl is pervasive through the show, and a reminder that its legacy is still living on.
Below are a selection of photos from the show, and a list of upcoming tour locations.
Alien She: Riot Grrl Archive
Ladies Sasquatch, Allyson Mitchell
Feminist Body Pillow, Ginger Brooks Takahashi
Ladies Sasquatch , Allyson Mitchell
We Couldn’t Get In. We Couldn’t Get Out, L.J. Roberts
T-shirts, Allyson Mitchell
EXHIBIT TOUR SCHEDULE
February 13 – May 24, 2015 –
Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA
September 3 – November 27, 2015
- Pacific Northwest College of Art: Feldman Gallery & Project Space, Portland, OR