[Fall 2024]

Theme presentation

by Jacques Doyon

It’s a story of the recognition of women’s contributions and an affirmation of their values and their strength, a story of matrilinear transmission, of commitment to community, of sisterhood and solidarity. It’s the story of an age-old yet still ongoing fight, as much for young generations as for those who came before them, as valid in a context of decolonization as in one of resistance to Islamic fundamentalism, as relevant to Indigenous peoples as to Kurds, and still pertinent in the West. The king is always omnipotent in cultures in which he can make any move at all to preserve his assets and power. In such a context, although they are not intrinsically women warriors, women are at war.

Caroline Monnet
Sororité
As part of her wide-ranging, shape-shifting practice, Caroline Monnet has produced a series of photographs and films that underline the importance and force of Indigenous women. Her composite and multigenerational portraits emphasize the transmission of values and the rehabilitation of communities’ history in a context of decolonization. Portraits of contemporary artists are intermingled with archival photographs that are offered as images of sisterhood; their strength and beauty were recognized when the installation Debouttes! was acquired by UNESCO, in Paris.
with an essay by Caroline Nepton Hotte

Zaynê Akyol
NÛJEN, les combattantes
A documentary filmmaker known for her works showing the importance of women’s commitment to the war against the Islamic State in Kurdistan and Syria, Zaynê Akyol also produces series of photographs that allow her to convey with greater immediacy the experience and solidarity of these female fighters on the front line. She spent many months with them in order to portray their calm strength. These young women, in military uniform or at rest, follow upon the generations of women who went before them in the hard fight of resistance against the fundamentalist aggressor.
with an essay by Claudia Polledri

Suzy Lake
Game Theory: Global Gamesmanship
In the lineage of the photographic performances that brought her to prominence, Suzy Lake stages herself as both queen and pawn in a chess game that illustrates power relations in Western society. On a broken stage before a dusky backdrop, the queen is sad, aware of all the collateral damage associated with exercising power. She is a new type of queen – heir to the pawns’ lengthy crossing of the chess board – who defies the rules of a game that is more accentuated than ever in these times of strongmen’s plebiscites and regimes.
with an essay by Erin Silver

[ Complete issue, in print and digital version, available here: Ciel variable 127 – SISTERS, FIGHTERS, QUEENS ]
[ Complete article in digital version available here: Sisters, Fighters, Queens]