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#5 fierce pussy: ﹡
10 September–22 October 2022

Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net THESES ON HOPE #5 fierce pussy:* 10 September–22 October 2022 Between Bridges is ecstatic to present the first solo exhibition in Europe by the artist/activist collective fierce pussy. The exhibition underlines the collective’s long-standing and transformative interventions in the public realm, as well as their expansive investigation of the relationship between language, agency and community. Formed in New York in 1991 by a group of queer women artists/AIDS activists, fierce pussy emerged in a climate of homophobia and violent discrimination, one that saw the erasure of queer culture and spaces as well as the devastation wrought by the AIDS epidemic. Driven by the desire to defy lesbian invisibility, claim space, and collectively create means of representation and belonging, fierce pussy made work ad- dressed to their own lesbian and queer communities while also directly naming and challenging homophobic and misogynist government officials and public figures. Employing the aesthetics and politics of immediacy, their output was characterized by ‘any-means-necessary’ low-tech, low-budget production, replication and distribution. Initially formed of a fluid group of lesbian artists/activists, four of its original core members continue to collaborate—Nancy Brooks Brody, Joy Episalla, Zoe Leonard and Carrie Yamaoka. Their work continues to align itself with the lineage of radical queer-feminist practice to—among other things—deci- sively and joyfully subvert the patriarchal regime. The exhibition centres around the collective’s early campaigns, dissecting the politics of naming and being named, and exploring the potentialities inherent in reframing language. Over the years, their continuous remixes and adaptations incorporated the developments of queer visibility, terminology, and community. The show emphasizes fierce pussy’s earliest and primary techniques—xerography and wheat pasting—as well as the critical role these played within the queer rights movement’s public presence. Installed in different arrangements and sizes, the show offers an array of 15 multiples from the past three decades, all of which are taken from the List Posters and the Family Pictures and Found Photos series, initiated in the 1990s. Conceived as part of a site specific installation, fierce pussy also introduces a newly commissioned German List poster, put together with support and input from their German-speaking peers. The List Posters series brings together historical and contemporary terms for lesbians and queers. Often employed pejoratively at the outset, in time, and with successive liberation movements, the terms have been appropriated by many as part of a reclaiming, emancipatory vocabulary. Consistently preceded by “I AM A”—affirmatively naming themselves and providing a space for others to do the same, while embracing multiplicities and coexistences—the original 1991 posters are concluded with “AND PROUD”. The clos- ing line has changed since the campaign’s remixing for a 2008 retrospective at New York’s Printed Matter, where the collective wheat-pasted posters across the not-for-profit organisation’s storefront window and introduced the new ending: “AND SO ARE YOU”. Referencing that 2008 presentation, fierce pussy has conceived a site-specific installation for Between Bridges’ front window, which mixes wheat-pasted multiples of the latest English List remix with a newly commissioned German version, put together with support and input from fierce pussy’s German-speaking peers. Inside the exhibition space, and alongside their arrangement on differently sized crate stacks, the List Posters are joined by a range of multiples from the Family Pictures and Found Photos stacks series. In the latter, various slang words are mixed with images of the collective’s own members as babies or children; elsewhere, they employ suggestive text alongside images featuring unknown people in pairs and groups. The  Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net work attests to the at once harmful and emancipatory qualities of language as a tool that can both transform the present and offer hopeful glimpses of a possible future. Please feel free to take, replicate, and disseminate the posters. fierce pussy and Between Bridges would like to thank Pauline Boudry, Henrike Hannemann, Ina Hielscher, Andrea Geyer, Susanne Huber, Renate Lorenz, Barbara Schroeder and virgil b/g taylor for their invaluable translation advice and support. Works on display: Window fronts English and German List Posters 2018–2022 black and white photocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows 251 x 801 cm Exhibition space 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos 1991–2022 black and white photocopies, stacking crates posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable Lover of women 1992/2022 inkjet print on bond paper wheat-pasted to gallery wall 250 x 386 cm  Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net THESES ON HOPE #5 fierce pussy:* 10. September - 22. Oktober 2022 Between Bridges freut sich außerordentlich, die erste europäische Einzelausstellung des Künstlerinnen- und Aktivisteninnenkollektivs fierce pussy zu präsentieren. Die Ausstellung unterstreicht damit die Bedeutung ihrer langjährigen, transformativen Interventionen im öffentlichen Raum und ihrer umfassenden Untersu- chungen der Beziehung zwischen Sprache, Handlungsfähigkeit und Gemeinschaftsbildung. fierce pussy wurde 1991 in New York von einer Gruppe queerer Künstlerinnen und AIDS-Aktivistin- nen inmitten eines Klimas der Homophobie und gewalttätigen Diskriminierung gegründet, das durch die Auslöschung queerer Kultur und Räume sowie durch die verheerenden Folgen der AIDS-Epidemie ge- prägt war. Angetrieben von dem Begehren, lesbischer Nichtsichtbarkeit entgegenzutreten, eigene Räume zu beanspruchen und gemeinsam Ressourcen für Selbstrepräsentation und Zusammengehörigkeitsgefühl zu schaffen, wandten sich fierce pussys Arbeiten an ihre eigenen lesbischen und queeren Communities – während sie gleichzeitig homophobe und frauenfeindliche Regierungsmitglieder und Personen des öffen- tlichen Lebens direkt adressierten und herausforderten. Ihre ästhetische und politische Haltung der Unmit- telbarkeit zeichnete sich durch eine ‚mit allen nötigen Mitteln’-Low-Tech- und Low-Budget-Produktion, - Vervielfältigung und -Verbreitung aus. Ursprünglich aus einer fluiden Gruppe lesbischer Künstlerinnen/ Aktivistinnen zusammengesetzt, arbeiten vier der Gründungsmitglieder weiterhin zusammen: Nancy Brooks Brody, Joy Episalla, Zoe Leonard und Carrie Yamaoka. Ihre Arbeit reiht sich weiterhin in die Tradition radi- kaler queer-feministischer Praxis ein, um, unter anderem, das patriarchalische Regime entschieden und mit Freude zu unterwandern. Im Mittelpunkt der Ausstellung stehen die frühen Kampagnen des Kollektivs, die sich mit der Politik des Benennens und Benannt-Werdens auseinandersetzen und die Potentialität erforschen, die in der Umgestal- tung von Sprache liegt. Die kontinuierlichen Überarbeitungen und Adaptionen bezogen dabei im Verlauf der Jahre immer die Entwicklungen innerhalb von queeren Sichtbarkeiten, Begriffs und Gemeinschaftsbil- dungen mit ein. Die Ausstellung hebt die frühesten und primären Methoden von fierce pussy – das Fotokop- ieren und das Kleistern – hervor, sowie auch die entscheidende Rolle, die diese Verfahren für die Bewe- gungen für Rechte von queeren Menschen spielten. Die Ausstellung zeigt 15 Multiples aus den letzten drei Jahrzehnten in verschiedenen Anordnungen und Dimensionen, die allesamt aus den 1990er Jahren initiierten Serien List Posters und Family Pictures and Found Photos stammen. Die List Posters-Serie umfasst eine Vielzahl von zusammengesammelten historische und gegenwärtige Definitionen für Lesben und queere Personen. Anfangs vielfach abwertend verwendet, wurden zahlreiche der Begriffe im Laufe der Zeit und im Kontext der Freiheitsbewegungen von vielen als Teil eines emanzipa- torischen Vokabulars angeeignet. Den ursprünglichen Wortsammlungen ging stets der Satzbeginn „I AM A” („ICH BIN EIN*E“) voraus, eine affirmative Selbstbenennung, die gleichzeitig Raum für andere Personen gibt, das Gleiche zu tun – und zugleich Vielfältigkeit und Koexistenzen innerhalb von Selbstkonstruktionen anerkennt. Die ursprünglichen Plakate von 1991 wurden mit „AND PROUD” („UND STOLZ“) vervollstän- digt. Die letzte Zeile hat sich seit dem Remix der Kampagne für eine Retrospektive 2008 bei Printed Matter in New York gewandelt, bei der das Kollektiv eine Vielzahl an Plakaten über das Schaufenster der gemein- nützigen Organisation kleisterte und den neuen Schlussteil vorstellte: „AND SO ARE YOU“ („SO WIE DU AUCH“).  Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net In Anlehnung an diese Präsentation aus dem Jahr 2008 hat fierce pussy eine ortsspezifische Installation für die Fensterfront von Between Bridges konzipiert: Diese vereint gekleisterte Multiples der neuesten en- glischen Adaption der List-Poster mit einer eigens für diese Ausstellung entstandenen deutschen Version, die sie gemeinsam mit Unterstützung ihrer deutschsprachigen Weggefährt*innen entworfen haben. Im Ausstel- lungsraum und als Teil der Installation der Multiples auf unterschiedlich hohen Stapeln von Kisten werden die List-Poster durch eine Vielzahl von Postern aus der Family Pictures und Found Photos-Serie erweitert. Diese Serie kombiniert Jargon-Wörter mit Baby- und Kinderfotos der Kollektivmitglieder oder suggestive Texte mit Aufnahmen unbekannter Paare und Gruppen. Die Arbeiten zeugen von den zugleich bedrohlichen und emanzipatorischen Qualitäten von Sprache als ein Instrument, das sowohl die Gegenwart verändern als auch hoffnungsvolle Ausblicke auf eine mögliche Zukunft bieten kann. Die Poster können gerne mitgenommen, vervielfältigt und verbreitet werden. fierce pussy und Between Bridges danken Pauline Boudry, Henrike Hannemann, Ina Hielscher, Andrea Gey- er, Susanne Huber, Renate Lorenz, Barbara Schroeder und virgil b/g taylor für ihre wertvolle Beratung und Unterstützung bei der Übersetzung. Works on display: Window fronts English and German List Posters 2018–2022 black and white photocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows 251 x 801 cm Exhibition space 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos 1991–2022 black and white photocopies, stacking crates posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable Lover of women 1992/2022 inkjet print on bond paper wheat-pasted to gallery wall 250 x 386 cm  Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net Installation views: fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)       Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net Installation views: fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures and Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures and Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, Lover of women, 1992/2022, inkjet print on bond paper wheat-past- ed to gallery wall, 250 x 386 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)       Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net Installation views: fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)       Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net Installation views: fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)       Between Bridges Adalbertstraße 43 10179 Berlin info@betweenbridges.net betweenbridges.net Installation views: Opening reception of fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach) Opening reception of fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)

Between Bridges is ecstatic to present the first solo exhibition in Europe by the artist/activist collective fierce pussy. The exhibition underlines the collective’s long-standing and transformative interventions in the public realm, as well as their expansive investigation of the relationship between language, agency and community.

Formed in New York in 1991 by a group of queer women artists/AIDS activists, fierce pussy emerged in a climate of homophobia and violent discrimination, one that saw the erasure of queer culture and spaces as well as the devastation wrought by the AIDS epidemic. Driven by the desire to defy lesbian invisibility, claim space, and collectively create means of representation and belonging, fierce pussy made work addressed to their own lesbian and queer communities while also directly naming and challenging homophobic and misogynist government officials and public figures. Employing the aesthetics and politics of immediacy, their output was characterized by ‘any-means-necessary’ low-tech, low-budget production, replication and distribution. Initially formed of a fluid group of lesbian artists/activists, four of its original core members continue to collaborate—Nancy Brooks Brody, Joy Episalla, Zoe Leonard and Carrie Yamaoka. Their work continues to align itself with the lineage of radical queer-feminist practice to—among other things—decisively and joyfully subvert the patriarchal regime.

The exhibition centres around the collective’s early campaigns, dissecting the politics of naming and being named, and exploring the potentialities inherent in reframing language. Over the years, their continuous remixes and adaptations incorporated the developments of queer visibility, terminology, and community. The show emphasizes fierce pussy’s earliest and primary techniques—xerography and wheat pasting—as well as the critical role these played within the queer rights movement’s public presence. Installed in different arrangements and sizes, the show offers an array of 15 multiples from the past three decades, all of which are taken from the List Posters and the Family Pictures and Found Photos series, initiated in the 1990s. Conceived as part of a site specific installation, fierce pussy also introduces a newly commissioned German List poster, put together with support and input from their German-speaking peers.

The List Posters series brings together historical and contemporary terms for lesbians and queers. Often employed pejoratively at the outset, in time, and with successive liberation movements, the terms have been appropriated by many as part of a reclaiming, emancipatory vocabulary. Consistently preceded by “I AM A”—affirmatively naming themselves and providing a space for others to do the same, while embracing multiplicities and coexistences—the original 1991 posters are concluded with “AND PROUD”. The closing line has changed since the campaign’s remixing for a 2008 retrospective at New York’s Printed Matter, where the collective wheat-pasted posters across the not-for-profit organisation’s storefront window and introduced the new ending: “AND SO ARE YOU”.

Referencing that 2008 presentation, fierce pussy has conceived a site-specific installation for Between Bridges’ front window, which mixes wheat-pasted multiples of the latest English List remix with a newly commissioned German version, put together with support and input from fierce pussy’s German-speaking peers. Inside the exhibition space, and alongside their arrangement on differently sized crate stacks, the List Posters are joined by a range of multiples from the Family Pictures and Found Photos stacks series. In the latter, various slang words are mixed with images of the collective’s own members as babies or children; elsewhere, they employ suggestive text alongside images featuring unknown people in pairs and groups. The work attests to the at once harmful and emancipatory qualities of language as a tool that can both transform the present and offer hopeful glimpses of a possible future.

Please feel free to take, replicate, and disseminate the posters.

fierce pussy and Between Bridges would like to thank Pauline Boudry, Henrike Hannemann, Ina Hielscher, Andrea Geyer, Susanne Huber, Renate Lorenz, Barbara Schroeder and virgil b/g taylor for their invaluable translation advice and support.

fiercepussy.org/

fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures and Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures and Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, Lover of women, 1992/2022, inkjet print on bond paper wheat-past- ed to gallery wall, 250 x 386 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, 15 stacked posters from the series List Posters and Family Pictures und Found Photos, 1991–2022, black and white photocopies, stacking crates, posters: 42 x 29,7 cm or 29,7 x 42 cm each, installation on crates: dimensions variable (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
fierce pussy, English and German List Posters, 2018–2022, black and white pho- tocopies, wheat-pasted to glass storefront windows, 251 x 801 cm (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
Opening reception of fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)
Opening reception of fierce pussy: * (Photo: Niklas Goldbach)

Press on the exhibition:

  • Brigitte Werneburg, Wo die Natur zum Kriegsgebiet wird, taz, 20 October 2022 (DE)