Events 22 – 29 July

Some events for your diary for and about women for the week 22 – 29 July.

Activism:

27 July: Beautiful Bodies Beach Bikini Bash at Southsea Beach, Hampshire

A gathering on Southsea beach, promoted by the Hampshire Feminist Collective, to celebrate body diversity. An attack on the unattainable standards set by media and popular culture.

All genders/ungendered/non-binary people welcome, all body types encouraged. Invite everyone you know to be part of this event. And remember that if you’re on a beach, in your body, it’s a beach body.

21 – 27 July Walk for Women Brighton to London

It is split into sections so that people can do a whole day walking, or half a day, or just meet us somewhere for lunch, and it ends in Hyde Park on the Saturday 27 July with speakers at Hyde Park Corner, including Laura Bates of The Everyday Sexism Project and comedians Kate Smurthewaite and Sara Pascoe, followed by a picnic in the park.

27/28 July: Walk for Women  London and Glasgow

100 years ago in 1913, 50,000 women from all across Britain walked to London and converged in Hyde Park. They were making a powerful statement to government that women wanted the vote. They took action and made a positive change. Join women around the country to remember those women, and all those who fought to give women a voice.

Check out the other walks to see if there is one you can get to.

Art:

Until 8 September: Keep Your Timber Limber (Works on paper) at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), The Mall, London, SW1Y

‘Keep Your Timber Limber (Works on Paper)’ explores how artists from the 1940s to the present day have used drawing to address ideas critical and current to their time, ranging from the politics of gender and sexuality, to feminist issues, war and censorship.

The exhibition brings together the work of eight artists: Judith Bernstein, Tom of Finland, George Grosz, Margaret Harrison, Mike Kuchar, Cary Kwok, Antonio Lopez, and Marlene McCarty.

Exhibitions:

Until 3 November: Women in the Workhouse at The Workhouse, Upton Road, Southwell, Nottinghamshire

Drawing on oral history archives, the exhibition focuses on the involvement of women in workhouses in a range of areas, through testimonies including those of a former Matron, nurse, seamstress, hairdresser, cook and inmate, all of which help to provide an insight into the changing nature of workhouse life.

Artefacts, correspondence and photographs provide further insight into the often harsh reality of women’s lives during a period of great social change. Women also played an important role in bringing about change within the workhouse system through their involvement as social reformers and Guardians.

The exhibition is brought up to date with current staff reflecting on their roles and what The Workhouse means to them.

See website for admission prices.

Fundraisers:

25 July: Third Table Quiz for Choice at Doyles, 9 College Street, Dublin

Proceeds will go toward the second annual March for Choice. Get your clever-brain on, bring some mates or come on your own and you’ll be placed on a table full of lovely pro-choice people. Tickets €5.

Theatre:

Until 3 August: Dusa, Fish, Stas and Vi at Finborough Theatre, 118 Finborough Road, London, SW10

Commemorating the centenary of the death of suffragette martyr Emily Wilding Davison the first full professional production in more that 35 years of Pam Gems’ feminist classic.

Four determinedly ‘liberated’ – and very different – women ricochet around a tiny shared flat, while trying to pull together the shattered strands of their lives: Dusa is struggling to regain her children from their father, Fish is losing her lover to another woman, Stas is on the game to finance the course she wants to study at university, while Vi steadfastly refuses to eat… Tickets £16/£12 concessions (depending on particular showing).

Workshops:

23 July: ‘In Process’ Writing Master Class with Janet Paisley at Glasgow Women’s Library, 350 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow

Janet Paisley will talk about her career as an award winning poet, author, playwright and scriptwriter. Her many awards include the Peggy Ramsay Memorial award for Refuge, a powerful and moving drama set in a safe house in Scotland for victims of domestic violence. Tickets £6/£3 concessions.