Show 006 - Own it, examine it, and confront it head on
ARTWORK BY EDITH VALLE
DORF inaugurates 2021—2022 Exhibition Season with Own it, examine it, and confront it head on
Click HERE for media kit.
October 29–November 14, 2021
Open Saturdays and Sundays from 12:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. (or by appointment)
Poster ART by edith valle , 2022
Austin, TX, on October 4, 2021—DORF, Austin-based alternative gallery space, is pleased to open its 2021–2022 exhibition season with the presentation of Own it, examine it, and confront it head on, an interdisciplinary project featuring visual and performance art that examines rape culture, survivor justice, and healing.
Rape culture is a term attributed to second-wave feminists and defined as a society or environment in which rape is pervasive and normalized due to social attitudes about gender and sexuality. Behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming, slut-shaming, sexual objectification, degradation, trivializing rape, denial of widespread rape, refusing to acknowledge the harm caused by sexual violence and abuse, removal of autonomy, or some combination of these. This project facilitates discourse about these important issues and connects communities through three main components: a group art exhibition, public programming, and community partnerships.
Opening on October 29, the exhibition and related programming serve as visible and laudable dissent to rape culture and aim to amplify the localized conversation around sexual violence and abuse in Austin, Texas. The Austin Police Department has been in the news consistently over the past several years due to the discovery of a backlog of thousands of untested rape kits dating back to the 1990s. This project’s concept is inspired by, and a reinterpretation of, Suzanne Lacy’s 1977 performance Three Weeks in May in which the artist confronted LAPD’s similar indifference to active rape cases in Los Angeles at the time.
This project addresses critical issues in our community and offers an empathic space for artists and visitors to learn, process, and remove shame and stigmas associated with a difficult, but pervasive, problem in our society. “I want to give survivors of sexual abuse and assault a compassionate space for healing while amplifying awareness about local survivor justice initiatives, and sharing resources with our community,” said Sara Vanderbeek, DORF Founding Executive Director and Curator.
The intention of this project is to help heal, empower, express solidarity, and encourage victims to speak out. If we cannot change the culture of rape easily, we can at least change the culture of shame. “Art is a potent force for social change, for healing, and for community building.” Vanderbeek affirmed, “Through expression and consciousness we can empower individuals and groups that have had their autonomy taken from them.”
The interdisciplinary exhibition includes the work of over twenty local and international artists, many of whom are sexual assault survivors, and whose work includes video, painting, sculpture, photography, printmaking, installation, animation, and performance. The group includes three generations of BIPOC, LGBTQ+ individuals, individuals with disabilities, students, veterans, and community members who represent a broad range of views and experiences. DORF is honored to include the work of Suzanne Lacy and Leslie Labowitz, whose participation in Lacy’s 1977 Three Weeks in May inspired this project in large part.
The project’s title is inspired by a quotation by Naima Ramos-Chapman about her award-winning film And Nothing Happened (2016), in which the artist sheds light on rape culture and the aftermath of sexual assault.
**TRIGGER WARNING: content includes sexual assault, violence**
*DISCLAIMER: This exhibition contains adult themes and content, including nudity, sexual assault, and violence. Content may not be suitable for anyone under the age of 18 or vulnerable individuals. The exhibition is intended for mature audiences. Please view at your own discretion.*
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS
Christa Blackwood, Veronica Ceci, Rachel Alex Crist, Bug Davidson, Rakhee Jain Desai, Lydia Garcia, Christine Garvey, Jenn Hassin, Katy Horan, Alexis Hunter, Ru Kuwahata, Leslie Labowitz, Suzanne Lacy, Yuliya Lanina, Sadé Lawson, Eric Manche, Paloma Mayorga, Tahila Mintz, Teruko Nimura, Cruz Ortiz, Edith Valle, Sara Vanderbeek, VLM (Virginia Lee Montgomery), Cheyenne Weaver.
Poster by edith valle
Commissions
To commemorate this project, DORF commissioned Edith Valle to design a limited-edition screenprint. Proceeds will be distributed equitably to benefit the Artist in Residence program at Deeds Not Words, the artist, and DORF’s Artist Stipend Fund.
Prints on sale at the DORF website!
DORF also commissioned Sadé Lawson to paint a mural during the run of the show that will be unveiled at Heal, the November 13, 2021 community event.
PUBLIC EVENTS
Opening Reception
Friday, October 29 | 7:00–10:00 p.m.
Join us at the public opening of Own it, examine it, and confront it head on with a performance by Rachel Alex Crist, live screenprinted shirts and posters with Cruz Ortiz, and live painting with Sadé Lawson.
Heal, a Special Program with Stellar Guest Speaker Lineup
Saturday, November 13, 2021 | 4:00–7:30 p.m.
Join us for an activism and advocacy platform for bodily autonomy and survivor justice featuring speeches by Former Texas Senator Wendy Davis, Austin City Council Members Gregorio Casar and Alison Alter, Texas Representative from the 100th district Jasmine Crockett, Kierra Jones Jackson, and more; a recreation of the historic 1977 performance Myths of Rape by second-wave feminist Leslie Labowitz, organized by Sara Vanderbeek; a video shorts program; and artist talk with Tahila Mintz with a special presentation on traditional Indigenous medicine and native healing plants and herbs. Community partner Lone Star Nursery is providing plant takeaways for visitors.
PROGRAM SELECTIONS
Suzanne Lacy, Storying Rape (2012)
Video projection, duration 51:59
Suzanne Lacy’s Storying Rape was a performance in 2012 featuring new media and old, taking the form of a choreographed conversation at Los Angeles City Hall that focused on the current state of rape narratives and the opportunities for persuasion that might be found in alternative narratives. Nine leaders in media, city politics, theory, service, law enforcement and activism considered how the narratives describing the act of rape are presented in various spheres and how reframing these narratives might improve public understanding of violence against women. Filtering their ideas through the lens of narrative theory, participants discussed how changes in existing stories might yield new insights on violence prevention. A small invited audience witnessed the conversation including fifteen social media reporters who communicated the conversation to the outside world, translating the private conversation into digital communication via each individual reporter’s perspective. This was the culminating performance within the Three Weeks in January project.
Produced by Corey Madden, video by Peter Kirby, this collaboration with the Los Angeles Mayor’s Office and The Rape Treatment Center was commissioned by The Getty Center’s Pacific Standard Time Performance Festival.
BIO
Suzanne Lacy is renowned as a pioneer in socially engaged and public performance art. Her installations, videos, and performances deal with sexual violence, rural and urban poverty, incarceration, labor, and aging. Lacy’s large-scale projects span the globe, including England, Colombia, Ecuador, Spain, Ireland, and the United States.
In 2019 she had a career retrospective at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Her work has been reviewed in major periodicals and books and exhibited in museums across the world. Also known for her writing, Lacy edited Mapping the Terrain: New Genre Public Art and authored Leaving Art: Writings on Performance, Politics, and Publics, 1974—2007. She is a Professor at the Roski School of Art and Design at the University of Southern California and a resident artist at the 18th Street Arts Center.
Leslie Labowitz, Myths of Rape (2021)
Performance, November 13, 2021
A reimagining of Leslie Labowitz Myths of Rape (1977), part of Suzanne Lacy's Three Weeks in May (1977) forty-four years after it was first performed in Los Angeles. Here, the original piece is transformed to raise awareness of contemporary concerns around rape, sexual assault, women's rights, and activism. The performance will take place on Saturday, November 13, 2021, between 4:00 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. at DORF during the Austin Studio Tour. Six performers, organized by Sara Vanderbeek and Leslie Labowitz, enact compelling tableaux and spatial interventions holding mammoth fabric signs referencing Labowitz original poster boards, as well as protest signs, featuring current myths and facts about rape. These bold statements will activate the site of a common Austin neighborhood street. Activism and performance art has a role in politics today as it has in the past, particularly at this moment in history.
BIO
Leslie Labowitz is a Los Angeles artist and entrepreneur best known for her public performance work from 1977 to 1982 in collaboration with Suzanne Lacy on violence against women. These works educated the public on rape and how violent images of women in media and pornography contribute to real-life violence. Their performances have been featured in books and exhibitions internationally.
Labowitz was a Fulbright Scholar in Germany, where she lived and worked with Joseph Beuys at the Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf until 1977, when she returned to Los Angeles. She has taught at University of Bonn, University of Maryland, and ArtCenter College of Design. In 1980 she began an art/life performance called SPROUTIME that evolved into an organic food business that is ongoing.
PARTNERS AND SPONSORS
Thank you to our invaluable community partners: Deeds Not Words, The SAFE Alliance, Lone Star Nursery, Austin Beerworks and Collide Arts.
This project is generously supported by Interchange, a program of Mid-America Arts Alliance with support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and additional support from The Contemporary Austin and the Cultural Arts Division of the City of Austin Economic Development Department.
This exhibition is part of the Austin Studio Tour, a free, city-wide, self-guided art tour organized by Big Medium.
ABOUT DORF
DORF is an experimental gallery and arts non-profit located in the South Austin two-car-garage-converted studio of artists Eric Manche and Sara Vanderbeek. The organization was established in 2018 to support and promote Texas-based artists, build arts-based community partnerships and advocate for the Austin art community. Manche and Vanderbeek started building out their garage studio space as a response to the unavoidable closures of art spaces in Austin, attributed to skyrocketing real-estate prices and the shortage of affordable venues for art.
Partners have included Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, Austin Justice Coalition, Bat City Review, registertovote.org, Refugee Services of Texas, Center for Youth Wellness, Planned Parenthood of South Texas, and Big Medium. Their work has been featured in Arts and Culture Texas, The Austin Chronicle, Sightlines magazine, fields magazine, Glasstire, Art Daily, and more. DORF was awarded “Best New Experimental Gallery Space” in The Austin Chronicle, 2018.
COVID-19 PRECAUTIONS
All events will be held outdoors and in open-air indoor spaces. All guests are expected to follow Austin Public Health Stage 3 Guidelines, including:
Wear a mask if you are high-risk with underlying conditions or feeling ill, avoid large gatherings. Partially or unvaccinated individuals should stay home and avoid gatherings.
Capacity is limited and masks are required inside the gallery.
All guests will be required to practice mutual respect and social distancing.
ACCESSIBILITY
The DORF gallery and grounds are wheelchair accessible and there will be neighborhood parking with ramped sidewalks connected to the event. There will be a wheelchair accessible port-o-potty, integrated and dispersed wheelchair seating, and large print materials for people with visual limitations.