Issue 86 / March 2018

REVIEWS
“These women are asking
every venue, bar and cultural
organisation in the city to
question themselves: is
my space truly accessible
to everybody?”
Born In Flames
Grrrl Power and Hannah Bitowski
@ FACT 31/01
By now, many of Liverpool’s feminist, queer, and politicallyengaged
twenty- and thirty-somethings will be familiar with
Grrrl Power, a collective of three women collaborating to create a
platform for female creatives in the city and raise awareness about
issues concerning women, especially those from marginalised
communities outside of mainstream conversation.
Much of that activity has been focused on conversation;
creating spaces to discuss the challenges women face daily,
including harassment. Don’t Touch Me is a campaign seeking
to target clubs and venues to enforce stricter policies on verbal,
physical and sexual harassment, and to encourage victims to feel
confident in reporting such abuse, as well as giving others the
green light to step in and take action when they see it happening.
Other groups across the UK are doing similar work too, from Pussy
Palace (London) to Come Thru (Leeds), highlighting how this
behaviour has become worryingly normalised until now.
As part of FACT’s Refuge season – a programme of events
considering the idea of safe spaces in relation to art and cultural
institutions – Grrrl Power (Olivia Graham, Michelle Houlston, Aoife
Robinson) and Hannah Bitowski (co-founder of Queen Of The
Track, an alternative women’s magazine focusing on culture and
gender politics), present Lizzie Borden’s polemic BORN IN FLAMES.
Opening the event with an explanation of the collective’s
accountability statement, these four women stress the importance
of such guidelines. While I’ve engaged in conversations with
people who believe such formalities are a case of “political
correctness gone mad”, these reference points for respecting one
another’s identities can go some way to ensuring people of diverse
backgrounds and experiences feel comfortable in the same place,
and thankfully it’s something we’re seeing more of in our city’s
ever-developing cultural landscape, most notably with LGBTQ+ and
‘alternative’ events.
And why shouldn’t we? It’s our collective responsibility as
members of a community, and consumers of culture, to agree to
respect and listen to one another when sharing a space. Such
statements in no way limit enjoyment, or prevent experimentation,
but create an environment where audiences can feel comfortable
to be themselves, and to call out prejudice when they see it.
And so the tone is set for Borden’s documentary-style
feminist science-fiction film. The plot follows two New York
feminist groups, each using local pirate radio stations to convey
their message. After a political activist dies mysteriously in police
custody, both groups are galvanised into action, many joining
the Women’s Army, whilst being closely watched by the FBI and
a team of journalists. The film splices jarring scenes together,
pairing news reports with police meetings, picket lines with
intimate moments showing the various characters’ relationships.
Some of the most arresting scenes occur when Honey and Isabel
– the two group leaders – stare directly into the camera, spitting
into a microphone broadcasting to their radio listeners, melodically
enunciating the issues their communities face, and how they
must overcome. Music is hugely important in the film, with radio
segments pinpointing key plot moments, and the film’s title
coming from a song by the psychedelic experimental rock band,
Red Krayola, which punctuates the narrative.
Born In Flames is a stylised art film with a moody new wave
soundtrack and a message; demonstrating that when the police
and patriarchy will not help, women must organise, protest and
ultimately revolt in order to gain justice and safety for themselves.
“Which would you rather see come through the door: one
lion, unified, or five hundred mice? Five hundred mice can do a lot
of damage and destruction.”
Borden anticipated the importance of intersectional feminism,
as the film explores race, class and societal oppression against
women in addition to everyday sexism. The director also toys with
our understanding of labour, particularly in a montage sequence
showing female hands doing manual chores, from mundane
factory work, to putting on a condom, setting up the idea that
the Women’s Army eventually broadcast for consideration by the
nation: to pay women for housework.
In the same way that Borden created the script for her film,
so do Grrrl Power and Hannah Bitowski create their manifesto;
by inviting their peers to participate in a post-film discussion.
This democratic approach reflects the aim of creating a charter
that works not just to combat sexism, but to address racism,
transphobia, biphobia, homophobia, ableism and ageism too.
In essence, these women are asking every venue, bar and
cultural organisation in the city to question themselves: is my
space truly accessible to everybody? As Houlston admits on the
night, however, this event being hosted in FACT is immediately
problematic, as there are some communities who may not feel
comfortable or welcome in a gallery space, and subsequently that
earlier democratic discussion quickly becomes led by the white,
educated and middle class. I therefore hope that as this project
develops, Grrrl Power are able to reach out to other groups, hold
workshops and talks in more accommodating spaces and truly
listen to the people most affected by these issues, in order to
enact real change. !
Sinéad Nunes / @SineadAWrites
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