Written/collated by Jilliene Sellner (Canyella), empowered by female:pressure members, special thanks to Antye Greie (AGF Poem Producer) and Susanne Kirchmyer (Electric indigo).
A*: the network has changed soooo much since I joined 2004 but also in some ways it hasn't ...
This open space piece came about as a desire to reflect on female:pressure’s1 efficacy as a network as an advocate for womxn in sound and music. We wanted to talk about the Visibility blog and address criticisms/critiques of ghettoization made by some academics and others addressing the issue of quantity (such as the female:pressure database, the FACT survey and blog) and social justice; opening a reflexive dialogue within the female:pressure network and outside of it. We also wanted to explore how a network such as female:pressure, fueled entirely by voluntary labour, respond to its own evolution such as members’ various global locations, gender identities and ages?
What follows is a culmination of my reflections on the inclusion of female:pressure’s Visibility in the Electro exhibition at Philharmonie de Paris, female:pressure members’ responses to questions put to the network and a transcription of a video link conversation between myself and Kirchmyer and Greie.
Part I:
I clock the prostrate figure of Brian Eno on a bean bag pencil in hand, notebook on his lap, blatantly alluding to Rodin’s The Thinker. The plywood sculptural portrait by Xavier Veilhan dominates the blackened space. I could stop there and you’d get the picture of the curatorial direction of the Electro Exhibition at Philharmonie Paris.
It is very busy. Visitors queue to plug in their borrowed headphones to listen to samples of early electronic instruments and techno beats. People are dancing.
1 On the website, female:pressure is described as “an international network of female, transgender and non-binary artists in the fields of electronic music and digital arts founded by Electric Indigo: from musicians, composers and DJs to visual artists, cultural workers and researchers. A worldwide resource of talent that can be searched after criteria like location, profession, style or name. "Why are there so few women active in the electronic music scene?" Each one of us has heard this question a thousand times... Here is the answer: It's not about a total number, it's about how and if we are recognized!” f:p is a disparat membership of over 2000 members often with polar opinions on many subjects.
The female:pressure Visibility installation, a digital collection of images of womxn2 engaging in sound technology curated by Antye Greie, is mounted in a sort of corridor location. The images on the relatively small screen scroll past as quickly as my eye and brain can coordinate to recognise the subjects. Blink and you miss their faces, their names. ‘There’s Ola! Oh that’s Iris!...Sara!’ ‘Where are you, Mom?’ my seventeen year old daughter asks. In the context of the exhibition it comes across as if to say ‘Oh yeah. By the way, women do this sound malarky too but let's talk about (to your immediate right) Jean Michel Jarre...’ In fact Visibility is more visible on the exhibition page on the Philharmonie Paris website. [Me in my head ‘Why is this screen so fucking small? It represents 2000+ women!’]
Here, in the dark amongst the repetitive thumping of Daft Punk, women feature mainly as vocalists on male produced tracks or, along with the LGBTQ community, as consumers, not of vinyl particularly, but of techno dance culture and rave spectacles. Seen rather than heard.
The usual missed opportunity. Daft Punk and Kraftwerk (and Eno) take up the usual space normally allocated to white male geniuses in what is a confused collection of the history of electronic instruments and also techno. Detroit and black culture is absurdly minimal. A tiny aluminum statue of Éliane Radrigue also by Veilhan, is a missable ten or so inches tall.
If our ‘allies’ (male and female gig, festival and exhibition curators) are still unable to rise beyond colonial patriarchal structures in their work devised for general consumption, then how is social justice in music, sound and art, or anywhere else for that matter propelled? How often do I need to wear my sonic cyberfeminist killjoy3 hat to point out their thoughtless ineptitude in this respect?
Though it has a minimal presence in the exhibition, Visibility is set apart. It is not an historical archive, as such, but an evolving, growing reality of the present. However, it is unlikely that the passing audience will have comprehended this exciting reality amongst the surrounding spectacle.
2 I use this term as a potentially inept attempt at total inclusivity of ‘trans, nonbinary and women’.
3 My ‘sonic cyberfeminist killjoy’ (after Annie Goh’s ‘cyberfeminist killjoy’ after Sara Ahmed’s ‘feminist killjoy’) - note I realise this is probally not my coinage but I have not seen it referenced elsewhere as yet. It is simply a logical jump in the lexicon of disappointed feminism.
The previous day I had attended the Dora Maar and the Préhistoire exhibitions at the Pompidou Centre. The later was a fascinating romp through notions of prehistory, a 19th century imperialist, scientific categorization, in art, of something which we can’t totally comprehend. There are attempts in art to explore this unknown past. Alberto Giacometti for example, casting a male gaze over Venus de Laussel with his own interpretation of the goddess figure. In this context, prehistory (‘history’ generally recognised as beginning with the development of written language), is a romanticized phantasmagoria or a projected characterisation of something that no longer exists.
The exhibition dedicated to Maar, a much forgotten female surrealist photographer (and Picasso’s muse, as the installation made every effort to highlight) is subtly punctuated with confused messages in the gift shop. Categories of ‘female artists’ and ‘prehistory’ books are displayed quite separately from the ‘male genius’ canon. Exiting through the giftshop of the Electro exhibition I spotted only 1 book authored by a woman, Anne Petiau’s study on the reception of techno by teens and tweens, Techno media*, and none about women, out of several hundreds and at a glance there was a distinct lack in the vinyl selection on offer.
In both of these contexts womxn are mainly visible as sidenotes, controllable anachronistic figures (playing the theremin for example), like dinosaurs, muses or spangled dancers in a crowd or separate and lacking individual illumination.
Part II
ChatB chat, April 2019
S - Suzanne Kirchmyer - Founder of female:pressure, sound artist/performer
A - Antye Greie- Early member of female:pressure, sound artist/performer and curator of Visibility
J - Jilliene - Member of female:pressure, sound artist and researcher
A:
Where is feminism going if it is not critiquing structural injustice in general? Then it is not feminism.
J: I know of some criticism going on among artists from outside of Europe (SE Asia and so on) that artists being chosen because they are not white not based on their talent.
S: It is comparable to artists being chosen because they are female ...questions that arise often when we discuss all female parties. Who is doing what for what reasons? There is an inherent ambivalence if you tackle diversity/inclusivity - it’s always there once you turn your attention to this issue you add another bias that is working in the positive towards increasing diversity but there is an increased tension, not total equity that comes with changing the current situation.
A: If you do something like [f:p] it is political - There is always the same discussion. It’s annoying. Gatekeeping. Some people are hurt by that. We have to lift people up.
S: Marie’s question is valid.
[To what extent a mere representation of number of female nonbinary transgender artists can have any effect on structural change? At all and to what extent?]
J: Yes but there is this other practical element. f:p is a support, a safe place to ask questions, rage etc.
[The resilience of f:p network: We share productions, resources, ask questions, look for gigs, advertise gigs, share
news, share academic and other job opps, share difficulties in the industry and support each other. Some f:p members meet in real life. It is far more than a ‘forum’ of strangers...more like global colleagues. Simply being connected this way is empowering for many.]
A: But how does it manifest in the world? To make change so people feel connected? Every female electronic artist that I know in Asia knows f:p, especially because of the Visibility tumbler, but they don’t join. They think it is beyond them. People all over the world are encouraged.
J: The English is inaccessible for some.
S: Language is a huge barrier. For example when I was in Japan on an f:p tour communication was very limited. Even German speakers, English is difficult for them. No ideal solution for that. It is a shortcoming. We are trying to cross border/cultural boundaries and need to find a way to communicate.
A: It creates exclusion - we don’t have a solution for it.
I’d like to go deeper with the question of quantity - what is positive about it? And positive effects of database and network power. f:p is not connected on a capitalist surveillance systems that exploit our data - it’s sort of unique, off grid. Commons. Sort of . We should look at the negative side of the power of the network, language, technical limitation, when we disagree...For example, sometimes we don't agree on Palestine or trans feminism.
S: f:p is set up not to cost much apart from work time, but does cost, in [free] labour. There is an immense amount of labour that many have done for this to make it happen. From tech to admin, I pay for the domain, server to host database, and paid for the development of database. Sharing the expense is more admin work. But it is dependent on individuals for its existence but it's not completely commons.
[A simple interface.
We have no financial resources. Completely voluntary. It is not a club. Due to its voluntary nature, the interface has not
developed. This should not be confused with inertia. f:p remains simple and to the point. It is extremely active.]
[It is exhausting, not least because we are often ‘working’ (unpaid), our much stretched available time and in isolation, and when the good work gets deleted or questioned, trolled... We give thanks to those that do the work. That is so important. This is the work.]
A: Those tech tools don't exist yet. New decentralised tech that can facilitate shared hosting etc are emerging. f:p was established during Web 1.0!
S: Anonymity is hard to execute all the way through. The network thrives on personal connections.
A: There is a huge strength in that we are personal. We can act as an institution and anonymous in call out culture. Call out culture can change things if you are an ‘anony-mass’. It is powerful. Rather than individuals calling out.
S: But the negative emotions in that culture, all stressed out, how much does it change things?
A: It kickstarts change. Changes our thinking. Lots of women with the call out, their anger is negative and legit...the FACT survey took advantage of call out culture and facts. It is helping to make change.
S: The survey is not calling out anything, the first one released was calling for diversity by publishing numbers that already out there. Gathered and analysed and presented results.
A: But has to go hand in hand with calling out. It can't prevent pain discourse and denial, but calling out is creating really strong movements.
J: Iranian women in the Middle East for example are really difficult to get them on Visibility blog. It is actually potentially damaging to their freedom of movement or even dangerous or they can be intimidated or language barrier stops them submitting their image.
A: I’m dealing with feminist men in Middle East to get women to be involved in blog/festivals but they are not responding (the women aren’t). In Iraq and Iran women get murdered, killed if you are too visible. There are restrictions.
Part III
1) How does the female:pressure network effect you in your creative/sound/music work and/or daily life?
“I have been grateful to find a woman-centric platform ...” “I feel I'm not so alone”
“> Makes me feel more connected and inspired to do more”
“to have this network as background to strengthen your own position”
“...definitely stretches the way I approach writing my music.... Also, seeing women* post about their electronic music (something I grew up thinking was only for boys in terms of creation)..It’s a huge help since I’m all self taught on this technology. “
“questions about gear, how to hire musicians, getting exposed to new music/artist and/or needing $ support to help pay for a broken piece of equipment.”
“a global perspective...”
“the feminist discourse on it is often not where I am at. But it does keep me feeling loosely connected to people with some similar interests and concerns!”
2) What are the positive aspects of female:pressure for you as an artist and personally?
“a space to interact with, receive from, and give to other artists”
“The discussion, some rage, about gender and sex and language. I’m learning that just saying ‘non-binary’ or ‘trans’ really pisses off some people who don’t want to conform to genital based gender or sex.”
“seeing how it intersects with different politics. ..support people give each other (when that happens). “
“my autoharp broke last year and thru a crowdfunding campaign I raised enough funds to buy a new and a new case. Half of the financial support I received was from the FP community.”
“My musical horizons are regularly broadened and my sense of self is reinforced. “ “(the discussions of Rojava...). “
“possibilities to interact / participate in emancipatory spaces I had
no access to / information about before - > politification (that i was wanting anyhow)”
3) What do you feel the limitations of female:pressure are? How could that be changed/tackled?
“..sometimes I am a little tired of seeing us re discuss the same issues w/r/t gender politics over and over as new or younger or less politicized people participate ...”
“The same limitations any all-volunteer, inclusive collective faces... I wouldn’t want this to turn into a nonprofit with paid admins, and I wouldn’t want to abandon our inclusivity by drawing too many lines in the sand. F:p has thrived for 20 years embracing that wonderfully precarious state between nothingness and true collective-ness...”
“an organic creature where everyone [can] grow with [it].”
“>Lack of meetups in international spaces”
“limitations are not coming from female:pressure, the limitations are on society.”
“many things seem to be "bubble shit"...weakening "real" / "senseful" / working class / really affected peoples/activists positions...”
4) Do you feel visibility of females* in music (such as with the photo
blog) facilitates real change? Please explain.
“Representation matters -- when people see someone they can relate to in the media they feel more strongly about it and feel like they could do what that person is doing too.”
“even just having the repository of amazing females* in music is already important in itself”
“it can help in a mobilizing way ... redistribute some cognitive resources/resources of imagination.. But it isn't going to address the economic issues, nor will it address the problem of rape culture and patriarchal domination. “
“particularly for younger people. If I had seen women making electronic music as a young girl I absolutely would have started making it earlier, and young boys also
benefit from the counter narrative we’re presenting. And trans/non-binary kids also obviously benefit when more trans/non-binary artists are visible. “
“it, is necessary and has an impact.”
“> It can be an echo chamber, but the website is a good resource for those saying they cant find a female artist, no excuses.”
“independent female & antigendered & something else artists [fuck trans fuck cis fuck inter concepts they are oppressors language & perception] have even less chance to emerge than before, effect is mostly that female music becomes conform, stereotype and "nice + consumerable for the scene".”
5) Do you feel the FACTS Surveys are useful in changing diversity and inclusion in music. Please explain.
“a healthy amount of pressure on music festivals to book more diverse lineups.”
“inspired to do my own research and found out more about initiatives helping to support female-identifying musicians e.g. Keychange.”
“The surveys have certainly increased awareness, and we do see an (albeit small) increase every year ...”
“make people aware of the mechanics, structure, social pressure, and gender issues.” “This is a xtrem fight...mutual support is the only way to combat.”
6) Let's talk about racial and cultural (global) inclusion...What are your thoughts about race in relation to the female:pressure network and activities?
“the real oppressed & underground ppl, the working class is not really connected, represented or wanting
to interact.”
“cultural diversity is contemplated on female:pressure and represented by the different circumstances of every one of us.”
“the white women (especially cis) need to be aware of white privilege and make sure we’re creating inclusive playlists, setlists, lineups, etc.”
“I do not think in race but cultural heritage... its not a closed shop”
“[from] India the network sounds pretty white and cis to me, maybe diverse people don't identify before they speak. We're trying to encourage women to sign up to the network here”
“It seems really white, or at least the discourse on the list whenever I check it seems super white-dominated and white-centric. There are certainly anti racist and anti imperialist attitudes and events being organized and discussed, and I do see people who are not white participating.”
7) What are your main concerns as a musician/dj/sound artist at the moment? I'm trying really hard to get my next album and tour together.
“fight against genitalism (pussy = woman / dick = man laws, propaganda & education programs)
2. playing as brutal as possible, but in a way it is me
3. not be a part of the mainstream & male-stream
4. not exploiting myself
5. not engage in mainstream & self exploitation mechanisms in the name of "art"
or "underground" 6. survive
7. kick everyone in the face who is trying to call us / our friends "trans" or "inter"
8. plant a radical, militant & separatistic revolution for women that have "illegal genitals" & learn how to guerilla fight
& use weapons & military strategies + guerilla communication, win a territory where genitalistic laws & order is punished with execution”
“I feel like a no-placed soul”
“cracking male monopolies”
“Almost nothing has changed over the last 20 years“
“moments like #metoo are only a trend and will fade.”
Conclusion:
Are we ghettoising ourselves and therefore failing as sonic cyberfeminists? The tension between doing and change is hard to grasp; these aspects of my sound life, the work, run in parallel occasionally intersecting but then depart from each other. If we aim to deconstruct the geopolitical neoliberal agenda by default the aim is to deconstruct everything - technology, identities, how we consume. What is the realistic function of an unfunded voluntary online network which is essentially a resource for womxn artists? A cyber based, portal and basis from which to sonically mobilise our activist lives (Rodgers 2015) whether or not our sonic manifestations are compositionally subversive and/or transformative. Visibility, representation and data augment this support, yet I’m unsure of its reach beyond the converted. I think the point, however, is that female:pressure as a network is self aware of these limitations (particularly with regards to representation, participation etc).
‘The work’, the intervention, the discourse, the making of ‘feminised noise’, is the activism, subverting normative patriarchal culture. It is unsurprising to me that sonic feminisms exist outside of that culture and it follows that our work will not fit within it easily or at all, nor resemble it in anyway. It is the process of making the sonic artifact, the act of pushing our way into whatever spaces we can claim, that is the manifestation of sonic cyberfeminisms and online networks like female:pressure are enmeshed in the synthesis (no pun intended) of divergent intersectional ambitions.
References
https://philharmoniedeparis.fr/en/electro-exhibition https://femalepressure.tumblr.com/ https://femalepressure.wordpress.com/#_=_ https://twitter.com/DrMarieThompson/status/1101060332116684806
Andrew Kötting: Who You Walk With Alters What You See
By Jilliene Sellner
Andrew Kötting: Who You Walk With Alters What You See
Towner Art Gallery until 31 December 2017
If you have an interest in film that falls into the British psychogeographical genre you are likely to have come across Andrew Kötting, a local to St Leonards on Sea for over 15 years and an award winning film maker. The exhibition currently showing at The Towner includes three films which fall comfortably into a surrealist ‘exploring through walking’ category, much aligned with Patrick Keiller or Iain Sinclair’s work, the latter a collaborator here.
While the films have been shown outside of a gallery context, the exhibition assembles a broad range of ephemera related to each film, such as Anonymous Bosch’s stunning pinhole camera photograhs and daughter and fellow artist, Eden Kötting’s moving drawings and paintings.
‘Explor[ing] the outer reaches of the M25’, Edith Walks, is centred around Edith Swan Neck, King Harold’s first ‘handfast’ wife who, according to folklore, identified his body in the battlefield. A costumed group of four walking at a sort of military gait to a snare drum contrasted with the soporific singing of Edith’s ghost and the playing of bicycle wheel spokes with violin bows. By Ourselves follows poet John Clare’s footsteps through an exhausting walk along motorways, through fields and into suburbia by Sinclair, Kötting (as the Straw Bear), Eden (as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz) and Toby Jones (as the ghost of Clare). In the end Clare becomes “foot foundered and broken down”. Swandown tracks a 150 mile journey along waterways from Hastings to Hackney in a Swan pedalo (from Hastings boating lake), during which Kötting discusses various topics with guest pedallers such as Sinclair, comedian Stewart Lee and graphic novelist Alan Moore, through quintessential English landscapes and an almost physically present history where the birds in the trees are “the entities of people who once lived in this place.”
On first viewing there seems to be an almost exclusive white male voice throughout much of the film-based work. While Edith Walks revolves around the (almost silent) figure of Edith Swan Neck acting out an imagined devotion as unrecognised wife to a King while surrounded by men talking about her dead husband, the film still feels devoid of a female point of view (surely there is more to Edith than being a wife and mother). To feature Clare as a subject, whose misogyny is discussed in the film, and his journey in search of his long ‘lost love’ (does she want to be found?) or references to the drownings of Ophelia and Virginia Woolf in Swandown feels like a silence that can’t be ignored. Unless that is the point.
Having said that, I admire Kötting’s work. It is difficult not to feel a connection to the personal vulnerability and feeling of endurance, demonstrated in the act of (long) walking, for example, and the folkloric treatment of universalities like death and pain, though dealt with with quirky idiosyncratic humour. I was reluctant to return to real life and leave the dimmed gallery with the sonic aesthetic of multiple soundtracks amongst the ephemera or ‘evidence’ of the film-making process. Of course I have said so little about Eden’s work (is this irony?) which I find truly engaging with a depth of emotional communication that I find hard to explain. You will have to go see it all for yourself. Highly recommended.
Andrew Kötting: Who You Walk With Alters What You See, Towner Art Gallery Eastbourne until 31 December, Tues – Sun 10am – 5pm, free entry
Townereastbourne.org.uk
Non-exhaustive list of articles here.
By Jilliene Sellner
Andrew Kötting: Who You Walk With Alters What You See
Towner Art Gallery until 31 December 2017
If you have an interest in film that falls into the British psychogeographical genre you are likely to have come across Andrew Kötting, a local to St Leonards on Sea for over 15 years and an award winning film maker. The exhibition currently showing at The Towner includes three films which fall comfortably into a surrealist ‘exploring through walking’ category, much aligned with Patrick Keiller or Iain Sinclair’s work, the latter a collaborator here.
While the films have been shown outside of a gallery context, the exhibition assembles a broad range of ephemera related to each film, such as Anonymous Bosch’s stunning pinhole camera photograhs and daughter and fellow artist, Eden Kötting’s moving drawings and paintings.
‘Explor[ing] the outer reaches of the M25’, Edith Walks, is centred around Edith Swan Neck, King Harold’s first ‘handfast’ wife who, according to folklore, identified his body in the battlefield. A costumed group of four walking at a sort of military gait to a snare drum contrasted with the soporific singing of Edith’s ghost and the playing of bicycle wheel spokes with violin bows. By Ourselves follows poet John Clare’s footsteps through an exhausting walk along motorways, through fields and into suburbia by Sinclair, Kötting (as the Straw Bear), Eden (as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz) and Toby Jones (as the ghost of Clare). In the end Clare becomes “foot foundered and broken down”. Swandown tracks a 150 mile journey along waterways from Hastings to Hackney in a Swan pedalo (from Hastings boating lake), during which Kötting discusses various topics with guest pedallers such as Sinclair, comedian Stewart Lee and graphic novelist Alan Moore, through quintessential English landscapes and an almost physically present history where the birds in the trees are “the entities of people who once lived in this place.”
On first viewing there seems to be an almost exclusive white male voice throughout much of the film-based work. While Edith Walks revolves around the (almost silent) figure of Edith Swan Neck acting out an imagined devotion as unrecognised wife to a King while surrounded by men talking about her dead husband, the film still feels devoid of a female point of view (surely there is more to Edith than being a wife and mother). To feature Clare as a subject, whose misogyny is discussed in the film, and his journey in search of his long ‘lost love’ (does she want to be found?) or references to the drownings of Ophelia and Virginia Woolf in Swandown feels like a silence that can’t be ignored. Unless that is the point.
Having said that, I admire Kötting’s work. It is difficult not to feel a connection to the personal vulnerability and feeling of endurance, demonstrated in the act of (long) walking, for example, and the folkloric treatment of universalities like death and pain, though dealt with with quirky idiosyncratic humour. I was reluctant to return to real life and leave the dimmed gallery with the sonic aesthetic of multiple soundtracks amongst the ephemera or ‘evidence’ of the film-making process. Of course I have said so little about Eden’s work (is this irony?) which I find truly engaging with a depth of emotional communication that I find hard to explain. You will have to go see it all for yourself. Highly recommended.
Andrew Kötting: Who You Walk With Alters What You See, Towner Art Gallery Eastbourne until 31 December, Tues – Sun 10am – 5pm, free entry
Townereastbourne.org.uk
Non-exhaustive list of articles here.
