Essi Kummu, Minna Henriksson & Ylimuonio Sports Theatre: Battle for Art and Morality - Reading Theatre Concert
The work, written and directed by writer Essi Kumpu and performed by the Ylimuonio Sports Theatre, follows how feminist and radical works published in the 1930s and 1940s have been received in literary circles and how their feminist-leftist politics were simply not recognized by authoritative contemporary critics.
The reception was often even misogynistic. This has led to the marginalization and oblivion of the most important female writers of the time. The reading theatre will read aloud excerpts from the 1930s work of Iris Uurro , Tyyne Maija Salminen , Elvi Sinervo and Katri Vala . They were founding members of the left-wing writers' group Kiila, founded in 1936.
The work is based on Minna Henriksson's in-process artwork Kiila Feminist Archive , which traces feminist motives for the group's founding alongside the leftism and anti-fascism associated with the group. Kiila's archives from the 1930s have disappeared and subsequent historiography has not recorded feminist themes in them. Henriksson has sought to find intersections of feminism and leftism through the published works of these writers who worked in Kiila in the 1930s, which may have been the motive for the group's founding.
The literary excerpts are interspersed with lectures on the criticism received by the works. An understanding is drawn of the ways in which female writers have been subjugated and discouraged over time. The women of Kiila are a case study in the reading theatre, but unfortunately the same fate has befallen many other writers, visual artists and composers. History is full of forgotten female artists. How could we bring their works into a new light?
Photo: Marika Kastelli
SCHEDULE
Saturday 23 May at 6:00 PM
LOCATION
Loft Room, House of Text
Lintulahdenkatu 3, 00530 Helsinki
LANGUAGE
Finnish
BUNTING
€10-€40
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