Love, power and sisterhood

Culture

The concept of culture

The general popularity of the leftist movement in the 1970s included a change in cultural life. Individual creativity was to be salvaged; everyone should participate and stop being passive consumers. The cultural-political goals of 1974 emphasized this change, while declaring that culture should reach all people and that negative commercial effects should be conquered. This stance was also apparent in the women’s movement, in traditional cultural areas like art, music and literature, and in areas labelled as women’s culture. Even though culture is an ambiguous concept, the struggle for culture and politics made it crucial to challenge the male norm of interpretation, including everything from social values to the perception of women in words, images, and music.

Kvinnokulturfestival

Together with Suzanne Osten, Louise Waldén initiated Föreningen Kvinnokultur (an association of women’s culture), formed in 1975. The manifesto proclaimed that the association was “non-profit, independent of party politics, anti-imperialist, anti-patriarchal, and anti-commercial”. Royalties, paid from the association’s production of numerous records with “women’s music”, were put into a project fund. The fund still exists - grants and loans have been awarded to projects with sponsorship problems for over 30 years. “This, to my knowledge, is the only example where all the money that was transferred to the cultural and media business by the women’s movement came back to women’s projects”, was Louise Walden’s, somewhat acid, comment in the exhibition catalogue “Love, power and sisterhood”.

Women’s culture festival

In 1977, the association of women’s culture organized an extensive women’s culture festival – “Kvinnokulturfestivalen” - in the old Riksdag building. The festival, which lasted for three days, attracted 350 artists, officials, and 5,000 visitors. All aspects of women’s culture were displayed; one goal was to “demonstrate the connection of women’s culture and women’s struggle to political struggle”. A record, “Kvinnokulturfestivalen”, was released and the journal Vi mänskor devoted a special issue to women’s culture (No. 4 1977). The festival led in its turn to several local women’s cultural festivals around the country. The association’s activity continued in the 1980s with thematic seminars and the formation of local associations of women’s culture. Some of the local associations started women’s bookstores and coffee shops, e.g. Bokcaféet Kvinnfolk in Stockholm and Bröd och rosor in Gothenburg. The association was also a source of inspiration for the formation of Kvinnor för fred (Women for peace), which is still active.

Art

In the spring of 1975, Kulturhuset in Stockholm held an exhibition entitled “Kvinnfolk”. The exhibition set a record of attendance which remained unbroken for many years. Works of established artists were shown, together with the exhibition “Livegen – eget liv”. The photo exhibition “Arbeta – inte slita ut sig” was a political report on Swedish women’s situation including a section entitled “Kvinnoarbete – kvinnokultur” that illustrated women’s work in a mountain made of grey woollen gloves and mittens, and - at the top of this mountain - one with embroidery in bright colours. The diversity of the exhibition is further underlined by the catalogue title, “Kvinnfolk: kvinnoarbete, kvinnokultur: historia, debatt, konst” (Womenfolk: women’s work, women’s culture: history, debate, art).

Special attention was directed to Swedish women artists in the travelling exhibition “5 x 1000 år” (5 x 1,000 years) held by NUNSKU, Nämnden för svensk konst i utlandet (a committee for Swedish art exhibitions in other countries), which presented Lena Cronqvist, Lenke Rothman, Channa Bankier, Margareta Renberg, and Gittan Jönsson. Another important exhibition, “Vi arbetar för livet”, was shown at Liljevalchs in Stockholm in 1981.

Margit av Marie Falksten

In 1977 a still existing collective of artists, Sapphos döttrar (Sappho’s daughters), was formed. It was founded by Lotti Malm, Ulla Nordenskjöld, Bitte Richardsson, Lea Ahmed, and Eva Trolin. Active in the seventies were also the artists Marie-Louise De Geer Bergenstråhle (Ekman), Kristina Elander, Marie Falksten, Anne Lidén, Vera Nilsson, Veronika Nygren, and Anna Sjödahl.

Literature

The interest in women’s lives and experience was apparent in fiction. A multitude of novels written by women authors were published in the seventies. “Confession literature” was a common term, often used in a pejorative sense by male critics. The books were, in a way, examples of the Bildungsroman (emancipation literature) with a narrative built up similarly to this genre: the woman protagonist is hit by a crisis - coping with it, and recognizing its impact, she finds the way to a richer life. The female readers devoured these books and the publishers concentrated to a great extent on Swedish as well as translated authors. Det mest förbjudna [Forbidden Fruit] by Kerstin Thorvall, Fear of Flying by Erica Jong, and The Women’s Room by Marilyn French are some examples of the most renowned titles. The interest led to the publication of new editions of past authors, e.g. Moa Martinson, Maria Sandel, and Aleksandra Kollontaj. Further examples can be found in the section Further reading.

Music

Music, traditionally a male area, was another field where inroads were made by the women’s movement. There were a few girls’ bands in the 1960s, e.g. Plommons and Nursery Rhymes with Marie Selander.

In the seventies women wanted to create a music and an aesthetics of their own. It became important to control all stages of production - composition, song writing, performance, and technique. Examples of such bands are Andra Bullar, Husmoderns Bröst, Häxfeber, and Kvinnoväsen. Turid Lundqvist was one of the most renowned solo artists. There were exceptions from this principle, i.e. that everything was to be done by women - all the songs that were composed by Gunnar Edander. He wrote the music for a number of songs in “Sångbok för kvinnor” and for the records “Sånger om kvinnor” and “Fabriksflickorna”. The record “Tjejclown” was entirely made by women and came as a reaction to “Sånger om kvinnor”. The programme “Spinnrock”, produced by Mia Gerdin, and whose aim was to foregound “feminine overtones”, was broadcast on the radio channel P3 for six years.

Theatre

One of the women’s movement’s great achievements in the seventies was the play “Jösses flickor – befrielsen är nära!” by Margareta Garpe and Suzanne Osten. They were the authors of the earlier plays “Tjejsnack”, “Ge mej adressen!”, and “Kärleksföreställningen” - it was, however, “Jösses flickor” that made their names. The play had its first performance at the main stage of the Stockholm City Theatre in 1974 and was an instant success. The women’s association Jösses flickor presents the history of women in Sweden in the years 1924 to 1974. The play was staged on several occasions in the Nordic countries, and the songs were sung at meetings and demonstrations.

Kärleksföreställningen

In 1980, Garpe and Osten wrote a new play: “Fabriksflickorna: makten och härligheten”. This is a collective play about a textile factory, the meaning of working and international solidarity. With the aim to salvage the textile and clothing industry in Sweden, there were collaborations with trade unions and ABF (see the section Work). “When we, after months of touring – and sold-out, excited houses – arrived in Stockholm, the private, selfish, neo-liberal 80s had just begun, and the interest in ideology, equality and seamstresses’ human dignity had dropped to zero”, wrote Margareta Garpe in the catalogue of the exhibition “Kärlek, makt och systerskap” (Love, power and sisterhood).

Garpe and Osten wrote a sequel to “Jösses flickor” with Malin Axelsson in 2006: “Jösses flickor – återkomsten”. The first act is an abridged version of the original play. The second act, which takes place in the 1990s, is about the backlash that followed the second-wave women’s movement. The play had its first performance at the Stockholm City Theatre and - also this time - the play was a great success. Many of those with experience from the 1970s saw the play, this time together with their children and grandchildren