Curator and art historian Nathalie Herschdorfer shares with us her wisdom and thoughts on the body and body-image, the influence of photography on the self-conception of the body, including its importance in the emergence of social media.
Nathalie Herschdorfer talks about her journey of becoming an art historian, the experiences that have raised her awareness of the gender disparity in the art world, what this means for the industry, and for her research on the body and body-image. She speaks about several kinds of deconstruction and reflects on how the evolving photography practices have impacted these processes. Finally, she gives insightful thoughts on her book “Body” and the ‘feminist prism’, sculpting the landscape of art photography nowadays and how it has come to change through the emergence of social media. Nathalie closes the conversation with final reflections on the importance of women’s experience – as women – as they relate to their art.
Conversation Highlights
For more information on our guest or the podcast, please visit www.rawradical.com
In this episode, Laia Abril discusses the origins of her career, her methodology, the themes she explores in her work, often related to women, such as rape and abortion. She also shares her insights from creating art out of polarizing issues, and being a woman in the art world.
Laia Abril traces back to what led her to study journalism, then end up doing art photography through a need to communicate about certain stories. She discusses the myriad ways in which to express a story, and the roadblocks she’s faced during her career in attempting to shed light on certain difficult stories and realities. Laia tells us how her work has naturally veered towards a central theme: being a woman. Moreover, she explores with us what this means in the art world, discusses the roles of our institutions and the paradoxical fact that these very creative institutions are sometimes averse to work that depicts themes that still create unease: abortion, rape. She shares with us the intricacies of her art and the challenges of working with subjects on such delicate issues.
Conversation Highlights
To learn more about this episode or the podcast, please visit www.rawradical.com
Violaine Lochu tells us about her fascination with voice, which led to her art, and how this materializes in her performances and installations. She also talks about her thoughts on being a woman in her field, her work process, and all the forms her art can take.
Violaine Lochu shares her fascination on voice and how she uses it for her art, a transdisciplinary practice which takes its roots in encounters with humans and non-humans and voice recordings. She talks about her process, her discipline and emotional connection to her art, her views on being a woman artist, and speaks about her upcoming exhibition at the Galerie Analix Forever: MblaHah.
Conversation Highlights
To learn more about our guests and our podcast, please visit rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the swiss arts council, The city of Lancy, and the Republic and Canton of Geneva, Switzerland
Olivia Fahmy tells us about her background as an art historian in relation to her curatorial work, the co-founding and running of the independent art space Tunnel Tunnel, and the question of heritage, particularly attached to her recent curation of African contemporary art.
Show summary
Olivia Fahmy begins by tracing back to her roots: how she developed an interest in art history which propelled her to current career, explaining that she initially didn’t have encouraged exposure to the art world. She goes on elaborating on the question of heritage and legitimacy, having Egyptian parents. She co-founded an independent art space, Tunnel Tunnel, and talks about the experience of this collective and what they strive to achieve through their projects, with a highlight on diversity and multiplicity. She speaks about the relation between curatorial work and societal changes, being a woman in her field of work, the reshaping of education, discrepancies in matters of equality and identity, the panel discussions on photography she has created, and women photographers. She mentions artists such as Sim chin Yin, Leobang Thlako and Sabine Weiss. Finally, Olivia ends off with a word of advice for artists to fight against inequality and to be empowered.
Conversation Highlights
To learn more about our guests and our podcast, please visit rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the swiss arts council, The city of Lancy, and the Republic and Canton of Geneva, Switzerland
Nadine Wietlishbach talks about her career as a curator and her philosophy in relation to exhibitions and art, and insights on being a woman in her environment.
Nadine Wietlishbach has an unusual background for her career as a curator and museum director: she has no formal education or background in arts history. But her immense curiosity and interest for visual arts in all its mediums has propelled her to her current standing. In this episode we discuss the catalyst of her interest in visual arts, where she draws inspiration from, her approach and vision on exhibition creation and the space that surrounds it, the reality of contemporary photography being a medium of exclusion, and her punk attitude coasting through her career.
Conversation Highlights
To learn more about our guests and our podcast, please visit rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the swiss arts council, The city of Lancy and the Republic and Canton of Geneva, Switzerland
Founder of the Women Photographers International Archive (WOPHA), Aldeide Delgado comes in to talk about her organization, the ongoing research project that unveiled the work of past generations of women artists/photographers in Cuba, leading to a career defined by her contributions to photography, empowering women and gender equality through establishing meaningful connections and threads across multiple organizations, eventually redefining art history.
Show Summary
Aldeide Delgado has been on a mission to uncover lost art and artists, particularly women photographers, particularly in Cuba, where she started out. She founded the Women Photographers International Archive (WOPHA). While studying art history she noticed a gap in the curriculum that had failed to notice women in the history of Cuban Photography before the 90s. This has led to her ongoing research that aims to uncover some of this lost art and forgotten women photographers. This in turn led to the creation of WOPHA – Women Photographers International Archive, a rising non profit, and the first edition of a free international congress that gathers artists and numerous organizations with similar interests. She discusses the challenges of the research, the “Fast Forward Manifesto”, and the highlights of the Congress.
Conversation Highlights
To learn more about our guests and our podcast, please visit rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the swiss arts council, The city of Lancy and the Republic and Canton of Geneva, Switzerland
Celebrated and award-winning contemporary photographer Jessica Backhaus is here to talk about her artistic journey from being a child brought up around Art, to her photography studies, mentorship with Gisèle Freund, first assignments, and her current work as one of the most highly regarded contemporary photographers in Germany. She shares valuable insights and meditations on her career and being a woman in her field of work.
Show Summary
Jessica Backhaus has had a long career. So in this packed double-episode, we untangle the several aspects of Jessica’s life, roots, career, and passion.
In Part 1, she talks about her childhood and novice experiences as a photographer: from being a student in Paris, to getting under the mentorship of iconic Gisèle Freund, her first professional assignments, moving to New York, and being a woman in a field of work that held strong stigma against women at the time Jessica started working.
In Part 2, coming soon after, we will delve deeper into Jessica’s work, how she’s evolved along with her style, and the serendipitous accidents that led to her most recent installation.
Conversation Highlights Part 1:
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the Swiss arts council, the Republic and Canton of Geneva and the City of Lany in Switzerland.
For more information on our guest, this episode, or the podcast, please visit rawradical.com
Celebrated and award-winning contemporary photographer Jessica Backhaus is on the show as the first guest of the season to talk about her artistic journey from being a child brought up around Art, to her photography studies, mentorship with Gisele Freund, first assignments, and her current work as one of the most highly regarded contemporary photographers in Germany. She shares valuable insights and meditations on her career and being a woman in her field of work.
Show Summary
Jessica Backhaus has had a long career. So in this packed double-episode, we untangle the several aspects of Jessica’s life, roots, career, and passion.
In Part 1, she talks about her childhood and novice experiences as a photographer: from being a student in Paris, to getting under the mentorship of iconic Gisèle Freund, her first professional assignments, moving to New York, and being a woman in a field of work that held strong stigma against women at the time Jessica started working.
In Part 2, we will delve deeper into Jessica’s work, how she’s evolved along with her style, and the serendipitous accidents that led to her most recent installation.
Conversation Highlights
Part 2:
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the Swiss arts council, the Republic and Canton of Geneva and the City of Lany in Switzerland.
For more information on our guest, this episode, or the podcast, please visit rawradical.com
This episode is part of a series of four live round tables that took place in the art fair artgenève in early March 2022. They took place in French and will be available soon in English as a dubbed version.
La Fluidité du Genre, la Fluidité de l’Art/The Fluidity of Gender, the Fluidity of Art
Dimanche 6 mars à 15 heures, stand A10 / Sunday March 6th 3 p.m. stand A10
avec
Véronique Caye, artiste, FR
Angela Marzullo, artiste, CH/IT
Victoria Mühlig, conservatrice au Musée d’art de Pully, CH
Barbara Polla, autrice, commissaire d’expositions indépendante et galeriste, CH
« Et peut-être les sexes sont-ils plus parents qu’on ne croit, et le grand renouvellement du monde consistera peut-être en ce que l’homme et la jeune fille, libérés de tout sentiment erroné et de toute répugnance, ne se chercheront plus comme des contraires, mais comme frère et sœur, et comme voisins, et se réuniront en tant qu’êtres humains pour porter ensemble, avec simplicité, sérieux et patience, ce que le sexe a de grave, et qui leur est imposé. »
Rainer Maria Rilke
La fluidité du genre est une revendication majeure des artistes d’aujourd’hui, hommes comme femmes. Ne pas se laisser définir par son seul sexe, explorer d’autres possibles, d’autres définitions, d’autres indéfinitions. Le mouvement arc-en-ciel, LGBTIQA+, à l’intersection des féminismes et des humanismes, valorise l’ensemble des goûts et des préférences de sexe et de genre choisis de manière individuelle et autonome. La nébuleuse artistique embrasse à bras le corps la pluralité, mille manières d’être femme ou homme ou autre, ou tout à la fois. La fluidité vue, représentée, vécue par les artistes s’oppose souvent de manière frontale aux rigidités sociétales, parfois aussi de manière ludique.
De Cindy Shermann à Emilie Jouvet, la fluidité du genre est avant tout une appropriation mentale. Il s’agit, notamment pour nous, femmes, artistes, d’investir tous les territoires et de jouer à qui change gagne. La diversité des genres, leur multiplicité et toutes les possibilités de passage qui existent entre eux, leur éventuel effacement, leur indétermination, sont une richesse que nous choyons précieusement. La fluidité du genre, telle que la représentent les artistes ? C’est la possibilité de choisir son genre à chaque instant, de ne jamais être assigné à résidence ; la possibilité de se déplacer le long de la frontière, de tourte frontière, en toute liberté. C’est Chloé Maillet et Louise Hervé. Ce sont les argonautes de Maggie Nelson.
Texte de Barbara Polla
autrice, commissaire d’expositions indépendante et galeriste
This episode is part of a series of four live round tables that took place in the art fair artgenève in early March 2022. They took place in French and will be available soon in English as a dubbed version.
Sexisme, Discrimination Positive et Qualité Artistique/Sexism, Positive Discrimination, and Artistic Quality
Samedi 5 mars à 18 heures, stand A10 / Saturday, March 5th, 3 p.m. stand A10
avec
Emilie Ding, artist, CH
Delphine Bedel, artiste, éditrice et présidente de la Fondation Engagement Arts NL, NL
Nathalie Herschdorfer, directrice du Musée des Beaux-Arts Le Locle, CH
Alain Quemin, professor of sociology of art, GEMAS - Sorbonne Université / Institut Universitaire de France, FR
Lancée depuis de nombreuses années aux Etats-Unis par rapport aux discriminations raciales, l’idée de la discrimination positive est de favoriser les femmes dans un certain nombre de domaines afin de rétablir une forme d’équité qui, de fait, n’est pas la règle. Cette action désormais présente sous différentes formes en Europe suscite cependant encore de nombreux débats. On le sait, la majorité des artistes sortant des écoles d’art sont des femmes et pourtant il nous faut encore déplorer leur plus faible représentation tant dans les musées que sur le marché de l’art, sans compter la conception masculinisée que l’on se fait de l’Histoire de l’art de ces cinquante dernières années. Depuis longtemps deux attitudes semblent s’offrir aux artistes femmes qui sont conscientes de cet état de fait, parfois fluctuant à l’intérieur même de leurs pratiques. D’un côté elles détournent l’assignation qui leur est faite de la cuisine, la maison, les travaux « d’aiguille », brandissant ces pratiques genrées pour en faire un étendard de liberté et de créativité assumée. De l’autre côté du féminisme, certaines préfèrent construire leur œuvre sans référence particulière à cette question, estimant que c’est la reconnaissance de la qualité de leur travail qui sera la plus efficace pour le changement. Avec des groupes plus activistes tels les fameuses « Guerrilla Girls », on se situe bien entendu dans la revendication nette d’une place plus importante que les femmes se devraient d’imposer à un système de présentation des œuvres dominé par les hommes. Doit-on, pour ces artistes femmes, prendre des mesures comparables à celles qui changent la donne depuis une bonne décennie en politique ou en matière de droits sociaux ? Ou peut-on au contraire redouter un effet pervers dû à un doute sur la qualité artistique qui devrait être seule prise en compte ?
Texte de Frédéric Elkaïm
conseiller en art, spécialiste du marché de l’art et fondateur de Art Now!
This episode is part of a series of four live round tables that took place in the art fair artgenève in early March 2022. They took place in French and will be available soon in English as a dubbed version.
La Financiarisation, la Valorisation Économique et la Représentation Médiatique/Financialization, Economic Valuation, and Media Representation
Samedi 5 mars à 15 heures, stand A10 / Saturday, March 5th, 3 p.m. stand A10
avec
Laurence Rasti, artiste photographe, CH
Anne-Claire Bisch, directrice générale des Ports Francs et Entrepôts de Genève, CH
Frédéric Elkaïm, conseiller en art, spécialiste du marché de l’art et fondateur de Art Now! CH/FR
Les faits sont éloquents ! Si le prix record d’une œuvre d’art contemporain d’une femme se situe dans les dizaines de millions de dollars, le niveau maximal atteint par l’œuvre d’un homme doit être multiplié par dix ! Difficile alors pour certains de ne pas considérer que la « valeur artistique » des pièces réalisées par les artistes femme seraient inférieures à celle des hommes. On voit donc que la valeur « financière » surdétermine un biais de représentation négative beaucoup plus profond qu’il n’y paraît. Au-delà de ce constat, on peut également s’interroger sérieusement sur les analyses publiées dans les médias, qui amènent encore les « prescripteurs de l’art contemporain » (curators, collectionneurs, galeristes, responsables d’institutions, critiques d’art…) à établir la liste des « Top artistes » où les femmes sont reléguées à un petit vingt pour cent du panel. Ces chiffres ne signifient pas que le travail dynamique actuellement fait pour une meilleure validation du rôle des femmes manque d’efficacité. Mais il témoigne de la pesanteur d’un ancien système de validation du travail des femmes. L’inertie d’un mécanisme genré de reconnaissance qui s’inscrit dans l’Histoire de l’art est toujours bien présent ! Et au niveau des mécanismes purement économiques, la notion de « sécurisation » des transactions est évidemment à l’œuvre. En clair, la cote des femmes reste globalement largement inférieure à celle des hommes tout simplement parce qu’elles sont trop peu à être considérées comme les « blue chips » (les valeurs sûres) des maisons de ventes aux enchères et des grandes galeries internationales. Il est évident que la présence massive des hommes dans la direction des galeries ou des départements de ces grands acteurs du marché de l’art sont également des facteurs importants. Comment donc faire évoluer cet ensemble de phénomènes solidaires ? Peut-être en commençant à s’interroger de manière plus consciente sur les liens de cause à effet qui se nouent entre la valeur artistique, médiatique et économique de la pratique artistique des femmes…
Texte de Frédéric Elkaïm
conseiller en art, spécialiste du marché de l’art et fondateur de Art Now!
This episode is part of a series of four live round tables that took place in the art fair artgenève in early March 2022. They took place in French and will be available soon in English as a dubbed version.
Vendredi 4 mars à 15 heures, stand A10 / Friday, March 4th, 3 p.m., stand A10
L’actuel enjeu écologique est majeur. À̀ travers lui est engagée la survie de l’espèce humaine. Rien moins. À travers lui, se pose la question du maintien ou non de cette même espèce humaine au sein de la « Terre Mère », si possible dans des conditions non-apocalyptiques. Lutter contre le désastre environnemental ? C’est maintenant ou jamais. À cette aune que peut l’art ? Que peuvent les femmes, pionnières dans l’art écologique ?
D’un côté du ring – comme l’écrit Paul Ardenne, auteur de la première « bible » de l’art écologique mondial – d’un côté donc, l’art – une affaire de poésie, d’esthétique, de créations plastiques et d’élaborations sensibles. De l’autre côté de ce même ring, la réalité écologique à l’ère de l’« anthropocène » et sa déferlante de calamités de toutes sortes ? L’art, et nous, femmes, du monde de l’art, que pouvons-nous ? Quelles responsabilités pouvons-nous assumer ? Qu’avons nous fait, déjà ?
L’écrivaine et biologiste marine Rachel Carson publie en 1962 une des premières alertes au son de « Pour qui sonne le glas » : Printemps silencieux évoque un monde dans lequel les pesticides auront éliminé les oiseaux. Vingt ans plus tard, Ágnes Dénes fait pousser un champ de blé à Manhattan, puis une forêt de 11 000 arbres en Finlande. Starwhak, écrivaine pacifiste et militante est l’une des premières « sorcières » à lier féminisme et écologie et à poétiser la nature, en alliant action politique, danse, poésie, mythologie, voire magie. Critiquée vertement et ou-vertement par un Luc Ferry par exemple, elle est aujourd’hui une star du monde de l’art. L’australienne Janet Laurence crée dans des musées des « cliniques » pour les arbres, les poissons, les espèces marines en voie de disparition. La grande artiste suisse Ursula Biemann fait de l’écologie un art sensible depuis plus de quinze ans, après avoir travaillé sur les migrations vingt ans avant tous les autres artistes. Nicole Dextras, elle, aborde l’écologie du point de vue de la mode et nous propose de merveilleuses robes en feuillages et en fleurs. Et aujourd’hui ? Et ici à Art Genève ? Et demain ? Comment lier la beauté de l’art à l’efficacité politique – pour prévenir le silence des oiseaux – et notre disparition ?
Texte de Barbara Polla
autrice, commissaire d’expositions indépendante et galeriste
Dana Hoey, a San Fransisco born artist and photographer based in upstate New York, talks about her photography and video work which investigates gender roles, archetypes, aggression, and power in society.
For the last episode of the season, we welcome Dana Hoey, an American artist that captures videos and photographs, and blends fact and fiction to question society’s preconceived ideas of gender, relations between each other, masculinity, and femininity. Avid in her practice of combat sports, she integrates that into her work as well and uses it in the directions she gives her models.
She also talks to us about her thoughts on being a woman in the arts as well as her philosophy on motherhood and how it impacted her career.
Conversation Highlights
To read the story and learn more about Dana Hoey's work, please visit our website rawradical.com
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Raw and Radical Women in the Arts Podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the Swiss arts council, The Republic and Canton of Geneva, and the City of Lancy. We thank them for their support to women, culture, and the arts
Lyz Parayzo, a Brazilian-born artist currently studying in the Beaux-Arts de Paris talks about her art, inspired by her personal experiences, and which focuses on the body, gender identity, and fluidity.
Lyz Parayzo, a Brazilian artist who works sculptures, live performances and audiovisual pieces, is with us on the show recorded from the gallery Espace L in Geneva, where there’s an exhibition called “PornoChic”. It was inspired by one of the tale of the book of the “Erotic Tales” by the Brazilian writer Hilda Hilst.
In this episode, we talk about the feminine performative, gender, its fluidity and its place in the art world that sometimes remains conservative. Through her work, like sharply cut sculptures representing ‘jewelry as self defense’, she aims to create the aforementioned debate, raising questions on desire and violence and its relation to the feminine performative.
She shares how her personal experiences have heavily influenced her art, along with external inspiration through writers, artists and thinkers such as Lygia Clark, Hilda Hilst, Hudinilson Junior, Kubra Khademi, Paul Preciado and Annie Sprinkle.
Her work is provocative, and affronting to some. Some of it has once been censored. But her art, as her body - which she draws from for her creations - takes a political stance, as the LGBT community still suffers from hate crimes, phobia and rejection.
Conversation Highlights:
To learn more about Lyz and this episode, visit our website rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia The swiss arts council, The Republic and Canton of Geneva, and the City of Lancy in Switzerland. We thank them for their support to culture, women and the arts.
Calling herself a ‘visual narrator’, ‘intimate outsider’, and ‘subjective documentarist’, Mimiko Türkkan comes on the show to talk about her visual video project on water, in relation to fear, her creative process and social identity.
Our unique guest in this episode is Turkish artist Mimiko Türkkan. She creates artwork such as photography series, books and videos with a focus on gender roles and socially constructed identities.
She shares with us her artistic process in coming up with ideas, forming a narrative and going through a project. We focus particularly on her most recent creative endeavour, resulting in “Energy Watery Incantations” in the Galerie Analix Forever in Geneva, to which we get to listen to an excerpt.
She investigates her fears, in relation to ‘the flow’, her creative process and her relation to the world. With traveling and physical activity playing a major role in her artistic process, she gives us a glimpse into the making of “Energy Watery Incantations.” She also gives her piece about being a woman in the arts and gender equality in Turkey.
We also welcome Barbara Polla, owner of the Galerie Analix Forever, adding to the subject of the show ‘Water Paintings’, having had the opportunity to follow Mimiko throughout her creation.
Conversation Highlights:
To listen to read the story and learn more about Mimiko, please go to our website www.rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by Pro Helvetia the Swiss arts council, The Republic and Canton of Geneva, and the city of Lancy, Switzerland. We thank them for their support to culture, women, and the arts.
Spanish curator, art historian, writer and currently the director of the Art Gender Nature Institute at the FHNW Academy of Art and Design in Basel, Chus Martinez talks about reimagining the exhibition public space, the transformative role of art in society and being a woman in her field of work.
It’s a pleasure to welcome Chus Martinez to the show and to listen to her enriching thoughts, opinions, and experiences as a woman in the very pit of the artworld. She talks about how she reimagines and innovates the exhibition space as a curator, art’s powerful impact in driving social change, and being a woman in the art world.
We also discuss the mindset of artists working collaboratively versus this false idea of “the genius”, the experience of being immersed in the art education world, and the gradual coming back of man into cohabitation with nature.
Conversation Highlights:
For more information on our guest, read the show notes or the transcript, know more about our podcast, or subscribe to our newsletter, please go to our website www.rawradical.com
This podcast is made with the support of prohelvetia the Swiss Arts Council, The Republic and Canton of Geneva and the City of Lancy, Switzerland. We thank them for their support for culture, women, and the arts.
Photojournalist, and then litigator turned one of the most celebrated photographers of the female nude of our time, Renée Jacobs talks about her career transformation, the visual representation of women in society and being a queer woman in her field of work.
I’m happy to receive Renée Jacobs on today’s episode. She explains her career choices and transitions, details on her “PARIS” and “POLAROIDS” book, insights and anecdotes on the pressure of being a woman, especially queer, photographer of the female nude.
We also highlight the importance of authenticity in the depiction of female sensuality, and of accurately shaping our own image (as women). In her words, “women can’t be heard if we can’t be seen.”
Conversation Highlights:
For more information on our guest, read the show notes, see the transcript, know more about our podcast, or subscribe to our newsletter, please go to our website www.rawradical.com
This podcast is made with the support of prohelvetia the Swiss Arts Council, The Republic and Canton of Geneva and the City of Lancy, Switzerland. We thank them for their support for culture, women, and the arts.
Radical feminist artist, video artist, and Italian-Swiss performer Angela Mazullo talks about artistic alter egos, motherhood, and third wave feminism
Today I’m delighted to welcome Angela Mazulla to the show to talk about her artistic alter ego, how she has combined motherhood and art, and a unique oral history project she has nurtured over the past several years titled, “The Archives of Radical Feminism.”
Today’s podcast is unique in that it was originally conducted in French, and the interview is overlaid with an English translation.
Key points of the conversation:
Her artistic alter ego
Angela was born to an Italian father and a Swiss mother and grew up in a small village near Zurich, where there was a great deal of liberal thought and conversations about progressive political movements. This shaped a great deal of her early thinking and influenced the direction of her artistic exploration later.
After she moved to Geneva for art school, she created an alter ego for her art performances named “Makita.” She says this allowed her to have more freedom to experiment with more sensitive and provocative subjects in her performances than if she’d performed under her own legal name.
Angela says that “Makita” is a role that she plays that lends more power and depth to her performances, but because it is an alter ego, she doesn’t have to inhabit that role all the time, which makes it possible for her to be more courageous and provocative in her performances.
Being a mother and an artist
Angela says that she always wanted to be a mother, but unlike many women, deliberately chose to get pregnant with her children while she was also in school. At the time, this was a radical, defiant act because many women either hid their pregnancies or dropped out of school.
However, not only did she have two daughters, she also found ways to include them in her work, ultimately creating a project called “Homeschool,” which features her daughters reenacting portions of critical texts to highlight the childishness of certain critical actions.
The Archives of Radical Feminism
For the last five years, Angela has been working on an oral history project of feminism, which includes both recording conversations among contemporary women about critical topics, and transcribing an audio archive of 1970s radical feminist Italian consciousness-raising sessions.
These conversations and transcriptions raise the questions of how feminism has evolved over the last several decades. It also cemented Angela’s position that feminism is a movement best done by groups of women.
She says that as a performer, she is a lone activist. But once she began working with small groups of women, she realized how feminism is a moment of many and that it is a collective vibration.
For more information about our guest or the podcast, visit our website www.rawradical.com
This podcast is produced with the support of The swiss arts council prohelvetia, the Republic and Canton of Geneva, the city of Lancy.
Musician, educator, and mentor Laura Escudé shares her tips for success and self-confidence, and the importance of prioritizing joy in your career
Many of us are multi-passionate, but are told that we must focus on one thing to become successful. Laura Escudé, a multifaceted artist and entrepreneur, is here with us today to share how she has found success in her career. Laura is a violinist, songwriter, live performance specialist and sound engineer, and has worked and played with artists such as Kanye West, Ariana Grande, Bon Iver, and the Pentatonix. She also educates and mentors other artists and musicians through her Transmute Accelerator and Transmute Academy coaching and training programs.
Finding success through letting go
Laura says one of the keys to her success is hiring specialists and learning to trust other people to handle the work she hires them to do.
“I’ve been able to get a lot of help in the areas that I’m not the best at,” Laura says. “I think that’s one of the secrets to my success, especially in recent years, is hiring people that are better than me at certain things or their jam is something that I don’t really want to do or am not the best at, and that has really freed me up to do the things that I love to do.”
She also understands how challenging it can be to let go of control and feel okay with spending money.
“It was scary at first … because you don’t know if you’re going to make the money to pay them every month. As an entrepreneur it’s always a challenge ... but I always trust that it’s going to work out, and it always does,” she says.
Staying aligned with your passions
After she landed in the hospital during a tour, Laura realized she needed to focus more on her health and well-being. As a result she has become more thoughtful about where she spends her time and energy.
“I’ve learned that the most important thing is me being in my highest joy. The grinding that I did for so many years, constantly saying yes to everything... I can’t do that anymore,” she says. “So I do have to be particular about the things that I say yes to because once I say yes to certain things I have to say no to other things.”
Making time for her own creative projects has also been critical to maintaining her health and healing. Her 2018 EP release, “Transmute,” was especially restorative.
“It was a way for me to express how I was transforming. I didn’t know how at that time but I wanted to capture it in a musical format,” she says. “I just really delved into the creation of this music as a way to heal myself.”
Her latest EP release 'ENOUGHNESS' (May 2021) she produced during deep introspective moments in last year’s pandemic journey where she was forced to confront her inner darkness. She realized she needed to put the focus on her mental health after years of obsessing over her physical appearance and not loving herself. Escudé decided to focus on becoming more content with who she is and how she is being—and to help others on their path through her music and creations. ENOUGHNESS is intended to be a journey and space to cultivate knowing, healing and for transformation. "I use my compositions to practice embodied liberation and allow the creative space to be my teacher—to let the process be the process and let go of what it should be. I hope ENOUGHNESS becomes this for you too because you are ENOUGH."
Music: Embrace Your Shadow (released May 5, 2021)
For more information on this episode and our guest, visit our website www.rawradical.com
This podcast is supported by the Swiss arts council pro helvetia, the canton of Geneva and the city of Lancy, Switzerland
Brigitte Renaud shares the inspiration behind Pièces d’été, her contemporary art festival, and the similarity between engineering and art
Today I’m excited to welcome Brigitte Renaud, who is the founder of Pièces d’été (Summer Piece), a free outdoor contemporary art festival that takes place every four years in the village of Mabuisson. The art pieces are staged along a 5-kilometer path that meanders between the village, forest, and the shores of Lake Saint-Point, allowing visitors to wander between them and experience each piece in a different setting.
For more information on our guest and the podcast, please visit our website www.rawradical.com, subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on social media @rawradical
This podcast is supported by the Swiss arts council prohelvetia and the city of Lancy
