Freestyling

Let the Ladies take the platform and speak for themselves.

Ny, NoLay, Lady Chann, Lady Leshurr, Lioness, Princess Nyah, Alex Mills.

Feeling the Uncertain

Whenever I'm feeling uncertain I take a strange comfort in the work of Francesca Woodman (1958-1981).

Rebel Girl

I tasted the revolution in their beats and screams.

Eva Hesse

Post-minimal

Anti-form

Nothing is permanent

or can always be restored

Hang Up, 1966

Detail of Untitled, 1967

Untitled (Rope Piece), 1970

Marina Semyonova

The prima of the Soviet Prima Ballerinas

1908-2010

Kate Adie

Uncompromising,

authoritative,

straight-talking,

cool and courageous

in her 'pearls-and-flak-jacket'.

I used to be obsessed by the news in the late 1980s, when I was young (this obsession still continues).

I remember my Dad telling me about Kate Adie and why she mattered on television - until that point she was just another news reporter to be fascinated by. Maybe that's the best way to see her, as a reporter doing a job. However, like my Dad expressed to me at that impressionable age, she's one of the only female correspondents who reported from the front lines and she was the Chief News Correspondent at the BBC for fourteen years. From the London Iranian Embassy siege in 1980 to the war in Sierra Leone in 2000, via several bullet grazes, Kate Adie saw me through my childhood.

The Rule

In her comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For, Allison Bechdel laid out a criteria that determined whether women mattered in a film.

'The Rule', Dykes to Watch Out For, 1985, Allison Bechdel

To pass the test a movie has to:

1. Have (at least) two women in it

2. The women talk to each other

3. The women talk about something other than men

Think about the last time a movie satisfied the Bechdel Test.

Perhaps it's time we start demanding more from our scriptwriters and filmmakers.

Thanks to Women & Hollywood for this one!

TOMS One for One

If women love shoes as much as they say, then this is the way forward for footwear:

Imagine if Imelda Marcos only bought Toms...

Death of the Spiderwoman

Louise Bourgeois

1911-2010