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Feminist Studio Workshop Videoletter

Susan Mogul

1975 00:30:00 United StatesEnglishB&WMono4:31/2" open reel video
Tags:
Art Collective, Art History, Artist Spaces, Documentation, Feminism, Gender, TV production

Description

In 1975, the Feminist Studio Workshop (I was a member) at the Woman’s Building in LA, the Women’s Interart Center in New York City, and another feminist organization in Washington DC, attempted to set up a video exchange among feminist art organizations. This was the first videoletter on our end. I don’t know if another one was ever made.

The videoletter is a tour of the Woman’s Building. Pam McDonald, with microphone in hand, another workshop member, and myself, served as guides through the building. It was shot with a black and white video portopack.

The tour includes interviews with various women in different parts of the building: Sheila De Bretteville, in one gallery discusses the Eileen Gray show- the first time Gray’s design work was shown in LA; Judy Chicago, at a book signing in the lobby, she had just published Through the Flower. Susan King, in the upstairs gallery, discusses the quilt show she had just organized, and Carol Kern at the opening of her one woman show in the community gallery, discusses how her WICCA pal, Z-Budapest, a witch, had just been arrested for reading tarot cards.

— Susan Mogul

This title is only available on Susan Mogul Videoworks: The Woman's Building

 

About Susan Mogul

Since 1973 artist and filmmaker Susan Mogul has developed a body of work that is autobiographical, diaristic, and ethnographic. Her work addresses the human dilemma of self in relationship to family, community and the culture at large. Mogul’s videos of the early 1970s, as well as her recent documentaries, are often featured in exhibitions, publications, and college courses that examine the histories of video art, feminist art, and contemporary documentary.

“The conflict in forging one’s own identity in relation to a group — be it family or the culture at large — has been an underlying theme in my work. I was revealing attempts to define my self-image through humorous autobiographical anecdotes. In them I measured myself against influential role models.” 
— Susan Mogul