Womens Art Register to publish 30th anniversary editions of The Bulletin

Sunday 04 March 2018

Women's Art Register panelists
Panellists and members of the WAR committee at the recent 'Against the Odds, Women in Art Forum', Richmond Theatrette, October, 2017 Photograph by Veronica Caven Aldous

The Women’s Art Register is Australia’s living archive of women’s art practice (non-binary and trans inclusive) and a National, Artist-Run and Not-for-Profit community and resource.

The unique archive, based at the Richmond public library, houses the images, catalogues, posters and ephemera of over 5000 Australian and International artists.

Since 1975 the Women’s Art Register has provided an inclusive, independent platform for research, education, advocacy and support for its members and the Arts and Education sectors, enhancing the status of women artists and addressing issues of equity, professional practice and cultural heritage.

The Women's Art Register has also produced a bi-annual magazine called The Bulletin since 1988. The Bulletin acts as a contemporary, critical arts journal and this year WAR will celebrate its’ 30 years of publishing with two special anniversary issues.

Caroline Phillips from the Women’s Art Register explains how The Bulletin came about:

The Bulletin was started in 1988 in response to the special activities held in Melbourne in conjunction with the exhibition of artist Judy Chicago's The Dinner Party project. This huge work was shown at the Royal Exhibition Buildings, as the 10th and final stop on the world tour of this iconic work’ says Caroline. To celebrate this event, the Women's Art Register hosted a dinner for around 500 women alongside the work. Judy Chicago attended the dinner, as did hundreds of other prominent women including politicians, artists, educators, writers etc. The idea for a publication sprang out of the impetus of the dinner party collaboration and networking event, to strategically and publicly locate the Women's Art Register as a professional organisation with critical standing, and as a generative platform to give space to deeper discussion of women's art practices’.

Each year a guest editor is appointed and in 2018 The Bulletin will be edited by Dr Juliette Peers and the WAR committee.

‘For the 30th anniversary focus, we aim to commemorate the Bulletin's origins as a discursive platform for exploring issues about women's art practice and to connect us with communities and the world. There will be a focus on grassroots communities working together to achieve their goals of education, change, activism and agency for women’ says Caroline.

‘The first issue will focus on a number of recent public events hosted by The Women's Art Register, all of which connect us with locally based contemporary networks and communities beyond our regular membership base. We will have interviews, reviews and articles by and about the groups we worked with’.

Members of the public can access The Bulletin at the State Library of Victoria, the National Library of Australia, or at the Women's Art Register office, located within the Richmond public library. The Women’s Art Register archive is accessible to the public and duplicate Artist and Subject Folders held by the Women's Art Register are available for public viewing at the Richmond Public Library, during Library opening hours.

More information:

Women's Art Register

Richmond Library

Room to Create

Contact:

[email protected] to make an appointment

The Women’s Art Register is supported by the City of Yarra.

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