Journalist and presenter Kate Hutchinson and photographer Laura Kelly met in Havana, Cuba, four years ago and conceived the series in 2017, enlisting an exceptional team of producers to take on an episode each. Every episode is produced by a brilliant woman and is shot and interviewed by two brilliant friends.

I spoke to Kate to find out more.

Why did you start the podcast series?

I started The Last Bohemians because I wanted to hear a series where maverick women who have lived interesting, radical lives tell their stories. And I’d hoped that they’d deliver a bit of give-a-fuck inspiration to women, especially younger women and those who have, like I did at one point, felt anxious, unsure of themselves, or are constantly measuring themselves against others thanks to social media. My interviewees have the attitude and outlook on life that I wish I had more of, basically.

I also really wanted to properly meet and talk to Molly Parkin, who was someone I encountered almost a decade ago, over email, when I stumbled across her erotic poetry and asked her whether I could read some at a literary event I’d been invited to. She’s had the most fabulous life: breathlessly decadent and debauched but also bittersweet, outliving, as she says, most of her lovers. Although these days she prefers to make love to herself, which is brilliant and I hope to be doing at the age of 87, too.

Podcasts are so popular these days – why is that?

Because we’re all narcissists that want to be heard! Erm, no. I think one reason is because they’re a way of community building at a time when the internet can make everything so insular – you can pretty much find a podcast for every hobby or niche, whether it’s a TV show or bread-making, and if they’re episodic podcasts, they are reassuringly constant. They can help people to feel part of something.

There’s also something to be said for relatability – there’s been a huge upsurge in the popularity of the Two Girls/Guys Chatting type of podcast because they’re either funny or because we secretly want to be them. News, current affairs and ‘ooh, look at this fact’-based podcasts are a convenient way of keeping up-to-date when you’re on the move. They offer choice whereas traditional radio can sometimes feel repetitive and you’re at the mercy of the same presenters every time.

Why is it important to share stories of inspirational women?

Older women, in particular, are so often neglected when it comes to covering art and culture  – but they shouldn’t be. I find that most of the books I read are by women, certainly all of the memoirs, and they make better historians because they’re – not always but often – more perceptive and observant than men. And so, while I’m not the most well-listened podcast person there is, I felt that I wasn’t really hearing those sorts of voices in an audio series. You get plenty of radio series and TV shows where old men give their insight into significant eras in history but women’s voices are, a lot of the time, eradicated or relegated to the background. Where’s the interview, for example, with someone like Bianca Jagger, where she is asked about the effect that disco music had on her and why Studio54 was so vital? All you hear mentioned is that white horse.

How did you choose your guests?

Molly was a given, of course. I’d heard Bonnie do a talk with my friend Deborah Coughlin at a Tate Late and we immediately thought she’d be brilliant – again, talking about things like 1970s New York, something she is rarely asked to explore. I’ve always been fascinated by Pauline Black and when I saw that her memoir was being repressed, I leapt at the chance to interview her.

Pamela Des Barres is, again, someone I’ve long wanted to meet, and when I read a piece in the Guardian about groupiedom and the #MeToo movement, I  thought it would be a great angle to explore with her. It just so happens that at one point she was in the UK to promote a new version of her book I’m With The Band. Cosey Fanni Tutti just embodies everything the podcast is about: a strong, attitudinal woman  in her sixties who is still making forward-thinking music. She is unique in that she is always looking to the future, never back.

And Amanda Feilding – I’d found the picture of her in this gorgeous turban with her pet bird on her shoulder, read about her trepanning herself in the 1970, and thought she sounded fantastic. I’m fascinated by her research and the potential of psychedelic experience, though I’ve never gone there myself. Plus she is descended from royalty, lives in this picturesque tumbling country house and is, I think, one of the very last few true British bohemians or what you might call eccentrics who is still alive and still cracking on in the UK today. Each woman brought something completely different to the table and had a contrasting outlook on life but were bound by one important thing: they are unapologetically badass.

The Last Bohemians is available on Audioboom, iTunes Podcasts, Spotify Podcasts and Google Play Podcasts.

Ana knows that she can’t single-handedly combat the sexism and discrimination in the music industry, but does believe that she can do her bit to bring the work of some amazing musicians and singer-songwriters to a new audience.

I asked her a bit more about the project.

How long have you been photographing musicians and gigs?

I’m an indie music journalist and early-career artist and I’ve been attending gigs and festivals as a multimedia reporter for several years. Highlights include seeing Kate Nash, Florence + The Machine, and Amanda Palmer. But I also enjoy giving a bit of press coverage to smaller acts, which is one of the reasons I make a zine.

What’s the fascination with female musicians?

For the last several years I’ve made a conscious effort to buy music by women, whether that’s mainstream artists or buying EPs at local gigs. I know I can’t single-handedly combat the sexism and discrimination in the music industry, but I can do my bit.

Also I just really appreciate the female perspective – like the female gaze in art – I’m interested in what women think and feel. I don’t want to lump us all together, but I think there’s still a level of difference in the experience of being a woman that comes through in the music that’s made – especially when it deals with explicitly feminist or lesbian themes.

Why did you decide to create Girls To The Front – an exhibition of women in music? Was it a deliberate decision or did it evolve organically?

I decided to have the exhibition when I started screenprinting from photos I’d been taking at gigs and realised that some of them were alright! Also I wanted to be able to publicise some of the more indie bands featured like Houdini Said No, The Farting Suffragettes, and Fistymuffs.

What unique situations are there for women in music?

I think we’re responsible for making a scene, from picking up a bass guitar to being interested in an event on social media, it all helps. We just need to spread the word about acts we like (and be vigilant for the creeps trying to keep women down.)

Taking place London Pavilion at Piccadilly Circus, which was one of the original historical meeting places of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), and now home to a money exchange and rather distracting bakery, participants are invited to walk some of the steps that suffragettes did one hundred years ago. Behind a green door we are tasked to design banners, paint rocks, make rosettes, and go on secret missions – that may see them getting ‘arrested.’ Depending on the length of sentence you are willing to risk, and the means at your disposal, you are set certain tasks, some of which take you out on to the streets of Picadilly.

Designers by Helen Scarlett O’Neill and Harry Ross have recreated the Union HQ, Gardenia Café, and a prison cell where some of us end up. It’s all based on letters and documents from the National Archives, and particularly the testimony of Lillian Ball, a mother and dressmaker from Tooting, who was arrested for smashing a window in 1912.  One of many brave and passionate women, it’s her experiences that the event centres around, but imprisonment, cross examination and the risk of being force fed were by no means unique to Ms Ball.

A highly enjoyable but also emotive way to spend a couple of hours (don’t believe the hour duration that is given as guidance), the Suffragette City Immersive Experience is a great way to learn more about the trials and traumas that took place a century ago. But it’s telling that whilst out on one of our missions, we come across a modern women’s march. Even now, in 2018, there is important work to be done.

The Suffragette City Immersive Experience runs from Thursday 8 to Sunday 25 March 2018, and tickets are available from the National Trust.

Image – Surveillance photographs of Suffragettes imprisoned in Holloway. The National Archives Catalogue Reference: AR 1/528 Suffragettes 11-18, 1914

An eclectic range of styles, traditional forms, rolling free verse, the collection represents a broad range of backgrounds, ethnicities, ages and political convictions through the short vignettes to whole lives that are ignored. Sex work is still something of a taboo, hidden under the veil of social norms, gender politics and embarrassment.

Here there’s no judgement, but also it’s not romanticised. These women might work in the sex industry, but they are not only sex workers – workers, mothers, realists, feminists, victims, dreamers, saviours and healers.

But of course others judge, compartmentalising women into one part of their lives. They are shunned at the school gates while the ‘dad that picked you up like milk’ retains his role as family man says Darina in for the regular last Friday who asked what i want. Desire features heavily, as does violence. Sharifa is and was ‘abused…misused…amused…confused…refused’ she explains in give us a reason. Sylvia becomes desperate, taking vouchers to buy a new argos lamp broken by her last client.

There’s also hope. Some of this comes through a sense of solidarity and sisterhood. In olympic dreams 2012 Sharifa speaks of why she is here, reflecting that ‘mostly, if I do this work, then it means at least one less girl / is being taken against her will to have a body part put inside / her as she cries for her passport, her mother, her child. Daily life goes on. Tali works in a bakery, and in sunday is able to practise yoga and feel ‘ my body is mine tonight / lungs exude your touch.’

Through these distinctive and authoritative voices articulated in beautiful poetry, How You Might Know Me sheds some light on the exploitative and hypocritical industry worked by women with lives, loves and passions. It asks us to leave perceptions behind, and enter another world. But it also highlights that this world might be closer to us than we realise.

Published by Outspoken Press. Read this review on New London Writers.

Forced! No, but well, sort of. I’ve been writing poems all my days, love it. But it was just a hobby. I didn’t really think of it like that, more a diary I guess. Then a met a guy when I was 21 (now the father of my child) who really pushed me into going to an open mic night and recording my stuff. So really, that’s why. Then I kept getting asked to do gigs, which was more luck than anything I guess. (And hard work too!). But yeah, it was never the aim.

How do literature and creative festivals empower women? 

I think it’s so important festival. Last year I went to the Women Of the World meal in London which had lots of people who’d established the festival in other countries and one of the women couldn’t make it as she had been shot. For setting up the festival in her country. That’s what it means. For some, it’s life threatening to give women this sort of space.

I work with so many brilliant poets, lots of them female: Deanna Rodger, Vanessa Kisuule, Laurie Bolger, Sabrina Mahfouz, Bridget Minamore. They do so much and care so much and constantly inspire me to remember this stuff is important.

Do we still need feminism?

Yes.
Do you think that creative events like this can be useful, or is just masking over the structural and political issues?

I think creativity really is one of the best parts of humanity. I’ve no idea why the hell we’re on this planet but creativity seems to be a big part of it’s pleasure. It also often brings out the structural and political issues I think and makes them easy to engage with in so many different ways. I’ve definitely felt before like I’m not being practical enough by doing poetry – my last job was working in planning and youth work. But actually, it is. It doesn’t have to be, but it can be. Hearing midwives say they’ve snuck my poems into hospital wards is probably the current highlight!

Folkestone’s creative hub will be marking the event with a whole host of events that demonstrate harmony, celebration, reflection, advocacy and action – through the creative angle. This year’s theme is ‘#BeBoldForChange’ and the Quarterhouse programme embraces this. February and March are packed with films, talks, workshops and events that inspire and demonstrate the power and potential of women.

On February 11^th Hollie McNish, poet, writer and performer spoke about and read from her latest book, Nobody Told Me, stories and poetry about motherhood. She is completely convinced that we still need feminism, and sees creativity as playing a bit part in this. ‘I think creativity really is one of the best parts of humanity…and often brings out the structural and political issues I think and makes them easy to engage with in so many different ways. Hearing midwives say they’ve snuck my poems into hospital wards is probably the current highlight!’

Motherhood clearly changes things for women, and through their sessions the Motherhood & Identity Project are seeking personal testimonies and autobiographical exploration of what this might look and feel like through physical, social, or political aspects through workshops and an exhibition at The Brewery. It seems that even in an age where choice is apparently celebrated, that choice only counts when it is career orientated.

As Catherine from the project says ‘There is a certain boldness in claiming public space for women with babies on their hips and noisy messy small children to be welcomed in and to have their ideas heard. So much potential is lost when we treat women in this stage of life as only caregivers, or only value their contributions when they leave their family elsewhere.’

Ethnicity and nationality are also in the spotlight. In The Diary of a Hounslow Girl on Mar 29^th, by Ambreen Razia with Black Theatre Live shows the experiences and challenges of growing up amongst the city temptations as a 16 year old Muslim girl. Comedian Bridget Christie’s acclaimed show Because You Asked For It (Mar 31^st) challenges us to think about what leaving the EU means – all through humour and a bold female voice.

It’s not just gender that plays a role – age, ethnicity and social class all impact and diversify the lives of women. Boss(y) Girls is for and by young women aged 13 to 25 who are passionate about empowerment and speaking out. Their workshops offer the opportunity to talk, design, create, meet like-minded people and have fun. Inspired by Beyoncé’s words, ‘I’m not Bossy, I’m the Boss’ boldness infiltrates every part of the project. As founder Emma says ‘this project is all about teaching young women to be bold, and that you don’t just have to accept things the way they are – you can change them.’ ‘Guerilla girl action’ is on the agenda, where the team will be sharing the outputs from their collaborative sessions.

At the other end of the age spectrum, but not necessarily issues, Older Women Rock! is an innovative project run and devised by Leah Thorne, whose work explores identity and liberation. They’ll be combining visual arts, poetry and vintage clothing to raise awareness and explore issues that face women in their mid-50s to early 70s. As well as a pop-up shop and exhibition at the Space Gallery, a panel discussion on Mar 11^th, a debate with the founders of the iconic magazine Spare Rib, the Women Over 50 Film Festival (Mar 1^st), screenings of Carrie Greenham’s Home (Feb 22^nd) and Stories from the She-Punks (Mar 8^th) they host the brilliant Profanity Embroidery Group on Mar 5^th for an embroidery session to stich not frills and flowers, but controversial but necessary phrases on and in their clothes.

Subverting stereotypes through a ‘feminine’ activity sounds like a brilliant twist, and Professor Julia Twigg, Professor of Social Policy and Sociology at the University of Kent and a huge advocate of the work says that such activities are ‘vital’ to women. ‘I certainly want to endorse the responses of women to dress that are bold, whether through the wildness of their dress, or through their refusal to be bothered by it. I think we need each other to be bold.’

Entrenched attitudes are not easy to shift.  But creativity can help us think about and challenge these patterns, and give everyone the confidence to do so as part of such a collective event. From boldness great change can come. It certainly will be coming out of Folkestone this spring.

The story of a London teenager who finds that suddenly and inexplicably she has become an alien in her own country. Shala Nyx plays five versions of the same girl, after finding out that her world has changed, and she has no house, no home, and what feels like no hope. To start with she’s a familiar teenager on her mobile phone, worried about boys and shoes and arguing with her mum. But then things change, and we move to the stages of discovering that your world is falling down, needing to flee, travelling and being ‘processed’ – quite literally as a number.

As her image and accent shifts from Londoner to Arabic to Scottish, it’s startling how differently the situation portrayed appears. What seems unthinkable becomes a potential reality; what seems incomprehensible becomes identifiable. Terraced houses and bombed shelters all mingle, and the audience does feel a sense of collective identity, even from the safety of this beautiful venue. Although shooting and shadows replace loud music and youthful vigour for all, it may well be hardest for females. We see the girl forces and degraded in order to access basic needs, and ‘be less than I am.’ Independence and identity are irrelevant, and shame and judgement pervade.

Director Dominic Hingorani and designer and illustrator Rachana Jadhav have used the resources well, and Nyx risen to the challenge. Doors open and close and the screen action reaches into the live. In one poignant moment the familiar streets become coated in blood, and when in a café and call centre, being lured to finding a sense of belonging once again freedom fighting group the scene is surrounded by sinister tentacles. When so much has happened, for soldiers and refugees, the need to survive outweighs ideals, and some ‘turn on my truth.’

Half Moon is local venue that supports and provides for young people in the community, and the performance of her an important one to show. Engaging the audience and showing a hint of the struggle that some go through, whilst also capturing their attention and provoking debate is hugely important – for all generations. After every show there’s a question and answer session with the cast and team, as well as a day of workshops planned. Whilst I’m not sure that I could say I enjoyed her, I did absolutely love it. Creative activism certainly has a role to play in influencing  the future, and her is a wonderful step towards that change.

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But why, in a paperless postmodern world would not only someone decide to create something as archaic as a zine, but would so many people get involved?

I decided to find out, and Séan was gracious enough to indulge my curiosity and let me know…

Why did you decide to create the zine?

Simply? A real love of Woolf, that has continued from my teenage years.

There is so much admiration for Virginia in the air, she’s like an electric current that crackles through academic dialogue and cuts into the bedrooms of moody teenagers with equal fervour. She’s an impasse, a connection, an inspiration. I wanted to bridge that gap, to make scholarship more accessible for everyone and to platform those who don’t have access to journals or conferences, their words are just as important. I wanted a big, exciting, fresh discussion of Woolf, that helps us think about her in different shades, as well as reminds us of the original colours which stamped her so deeply in our memories.

What has the response been like? Is it varied and a large community?

The response has been heart-warming. In just over a month the zine is fast approaching 1,000 followers on Twitter, and has a healthy readership. The community is rich in texture, lots of Modernists; some of my own personal academic icons have spoken about it, which has left me a little struck for words. Apart from that, it has brought the Woolfians out of the woodwork from all over the globe. Younger critics, older story tellers. The discussion is really open, and I am particularly proud of some of the non-traditional responses: the art, the reviews, the poetry.

What is your personal fascination with Woolf?

Woolf writes beautifully, first and foremost. Her work makes the everyday a spiritual experience, and I find that taps into how I think somehow – the way she sees the world as fragmented, broken, up for revision and interpretation. I also find Woolf’s politics interesting, and drew a lot of strength from her words as a teenager. Being queer and young is strange, because adults don’t often talk about gay people to children. Reading about intimacy between her characters helped me touch a history that was hidden from me, made me feel like part of something bigger. If Chloe likes Olivia, that is one thing. If you are given the opportunity find out, it’s quite another.

When did it begin and why?

Around 15. I was a very awkward teenager, as you might be able to tell. My English teacher, Mr Simpson, encouraged my love of reading and brought my attention to Woolf (for which I am very grateful). From there I found Ezra Pound, Mina Loy and H.D. – I was hooked, and now I’m working on a PhD in Modernist studies.  

As you note in your introductory letter in the first issue, it’s been over a century since the first novel, The Voyage Out was published. Why do you think Virginia Woolf continues to resonate?

Perhaps people will discourage me from saying this, but I don’t think there has been an English language writer as important to our literary cultural heritage as Shakespeare apart from Woolf. She is an institution. Multiple, difficult, readable, slippery, gifted. She tore at the fabric of writing and put it together in this ridiculously beautiful tapestry. We work and rework her constantly. This is especially interesting, considering her relatively early death. She wrote scored and scores, it’s almost unfathomable. Apart from this weight, her command of words is incredible, she writes in a way people can engage with, it’s aesthetic and meaty, a stellar rendering of some of our hardest feelings, she sets the complex in amber.

Does she speak to wider society, or is her role more for creative people, or those feeling marginalised in someway, such as due to mental health or gender? 

Woolf is there to be read, if you like her. There is no point in making someone an untouchable idol, she has a lot of issues: tensions of classism, antisemitism, and so forth. But there is something compelling about her work, and we must take the golden nuggets of truth where they fall, to lean on a reference. I grew up working class and relished her books, so I don’t think she is posturing in an inaccessible way, only open to academics or creatives.

Gender-wise, we must remain pithy. There are some amazing truths in Woolf that still ring clear, but society has moved and many of her lessons need to be expanded to include women she herself could marginalise: working class women, black women, Jewish women. If we see her as part of a longer, developing discussion however, she remains vital and useful. Read her with contemporaries such as Sojourner Truth and Nella Larsen, as well as with more modern writers like Judith Butler and bell hooks. Feminism challenges itself to be better all the time, Woolf did that in the early 20th century as she is challenged now.

I usually avoid a discussion of Woolf’s mental health problems too much. I don’t like to romanticise the death of people who are mentally unwell, especially considering the allegations of sexual abuse. I do think people can gain strength from her writing though. Reading about Septimus Smith helped me think about my own mental health at a young age, and he is a character I draw on whenever I feel at a loss even now. And, it was inspiring that a woman who struggled and faltered could still produce this amazing work, she pushed through and persevered.

What’s your favourite novel?

Of all time, D.H. Lawrence’s The Rainbow. If you haven’t read it, do. People think it’s mawkish, but I think it’s brilliant. Of Woolf’s, To The Lighthouse. I have the parenthesis from the line about Mrs Ramsay’s passing tattooed on my hip, it’s haunting in some ways, but it really reminds me to focus on what is important, especially little things, which I tend to forget about. Everything passes, so we have to enjoy it while we can.

Read the zine here, and look out for the second issue, Woolf and Others, in February. And ponder your submissions for Issue 3, Woolf and Politics.

It was then, back in June 2015, that she decided to write a show about online dating. Swipe, now performing at the Camden Fringe festival, is an hour long performance of sketches and vignettes exploring dating in the modern world, and how choice can be paralysing, communication confusing, and the whole experience of finding love very much in flux.

‘All the scenarios derive from real experiences, and it contains a lot of my dating trials and triumphs. It’s a very real play that is swimming in the experiences of so many women.’ she says, but it spans the sexes. The tales are drawn from over one hundred interviews with women around the world, and whilst originally intending to be a cast of men and women, in the writing Alyssa realised  that she ‘only had a voice for women this time.’ This doesn’t stop it resonating with both sexes though. The small theatre was filled equally with men and women, and the nods and laughter came from both.

Corny chat up lines are nothing new of course, but the ease with which someone can disappear when you only know them from through your phone – ‘ghosting’ they call it; the simplicity of sending a dick pic, wanted or not; the disconnect between the persona you portray on and offline; and the temptation of simply moving on with only a swipe are all very much modern dilemmas.

Love’s not easy. New Match Collective have assembled dating horrors and highs through the lens of technology and modernity to create an hour’s entertainment that’s amusing, entertaining and utterly identifiable.

Running 18th -21st August at The Hen & Chickens Theatre, London, as part of The Camden Fringe. Tickets available here.

Running until May 21st 2016

It’s the first time Charlotte Keatley’s play has been performed in London in 25 years, but this production of My Mother Said I Never Should, produced by Tiny Fires and running at St James Theatre, suggests that the capital has been waiting that long. It’s easy  to see why the National Theatre ranked it as one of the most significant plays of the twentieth century in 2000, and despite it being the most performed play ever written by a female playwright, Paul Robinson’s direction and Tara Finley’s production keeps it fresh.

The family drama spans 1940 to 1987 and four generations of women, and explores not only the personal dynamics at play, but those of society and its effect work, marriage and motherhood.

The plot is simple – we have Doris, born in Oldham in 1900, her daughter, Margaret who inherits some of her work and duty values but is some more freedom, her daughter, Jackie, who has an unplanned pregnancy in 1969, and hands her baby daughter, Rosie, to her mother to bring up as her own. But as all mother and daughter relationships, the reality is all the more complex. The ways in which they mirror one another, even whilst trying to break away, are clear, and we see repeated a longing to be different coexisting with a desire to connect.

Of course things have changed and female freedoms extended and opportunities grown. There’s a sense of movement for the women – at one point Margaret says to Jackie ‘You’ve got to go further than me – otherwise, what’s it been worth?’ – but at the same time it’s very clear that much has stayed the same, particularly when it comes to the bonds and family dynamics. She herself made a similar assertion as young woman, declaring, ‘Well I’m going to be different! Women did so much during the war: there’s nothing stopping us now.’  Men are never physically present, but always casting a shadow, whether as husbands, fathers or bosses. However, rather than a play about women and men, this feels like more of a play about mothers and daughters.

Much of this is down to the convincing familial dynamics between the cast. Doris Lipman is superb as Maureen, showing grit, humour and strength of character even as she is constrained by conventions. Katie Brayben, Olivier Award winner last year for her performance as Carole King in Beautiful, plays Jackie, and manages to portray a wild child of the sixties to a mother parted from her daughter and the complexities of changing emotions and relationships. Serena Manteghi is vibrant and animated as the youngest character, and it’s touching to see her grow.  Huge congratulations and respect also has to go to Hilary Jones, who stepped in at the last moment to play Margaret due to Caroline Faber having to step down – this performance was the first configuration of the cast, and only the second time they had met.

Signe Beckman’s set design is sparse, with flickering television screens setting up the context of the time without overpowering the individual stories. Interspersed with movement through the decades are flashbacks, such as from Doris to 1923 when Jack proposed, and waste ground scenes where all four become children again, playing together and casting spells. There’s simple repeated motifs, such as the movement from ‘mummy’ to ‘mum’ to ‘mother’ to a first name, and the solitaire board that becomes a metaphor for winning at life by being an individual.

There’s no formula. The relationships between mother and daughter are delicate. Margaret says at one point that ‘You do what’s best for your daughter, and you find out it’s not what she wanted, or needed’ – a thought millions of mothers have had. But still the bond is there. The scene where the family sort Doris’ late husband’s house provides a particularly lovely lens through which to explore the relationships of the four women together.

Whilst watching My Mother Said I Never Should, I wished that my own mummy was there. I wanted to share the moments with her. This feels like high praise.