Go West Young Dykes!
In the summer of 1973, Billie, Carol and Dian set out on a road trip to escape the patriarchal, masculine culture of the big city. Driven by a desire of going back to the land and the belief that women must find new ways of living together, they leave Montreal and head West, driving across the United States all the way to Southern Oregon. The independence they find in rural lifestyle and its isolation allows them to assert themselves as feminists and lesbians: “Not back to the land, but back to ourselves”. In 1974, they buy a piece of land and create WomanShare, a separatist community where they live, build, farm, write autonomously. They also take pictures, document their environment, pose for each other during ovulars – yearly workshops organized every summer, joined by women coming from the city or other lesbians lands.
Borrowing its title from a 1976 book co-written by the members of WomanShare, Country Lesbians: an archive of the Womanshare collective pays tribute to this major yet little known piece of herstory. Through archival images, flyers and ephemera, snapshots of intimate moments and artistic experiments, the exhibition looks back at 1960s-70s drive for new modes of living and belonging, while highlighting usages of photography as a feminist and collective practice. Shmorévaz exhibits these images and documents for the very first time in France.
Shmorévaz
Shmorévaz is an independent art space opened in October 2021 in Paris. Located in a former shoe store, it is activated through exhibitions, performances, readings, listening sessions, and conversations. “Shmo” – as some call it – supports practices that are often transdisciplinary and experimental, with a focus on editorial projects coming from queer and DIY cultures. In parallel with the exhibition programming, the space is also a bookstore specializing in independent publications (zines, artists’ books, magazines, etc.).