Domestic fronts: arrangements for feminist living, or survival is not a metaphor

Beginning with a reflection on the protestors’ DIY dwelling arrangements at the women’s peace camp at Greenham Common (1981-2000, UK), this chapter examines the multifarious ways in which domesticity is evoked, restaged, critiqued, and reclaimed across artistic practices and visual activism shaped and motivated by feminism. Dwelling matters as both symbol and material necessity for the survival of vulnerable bodies, sustained by continuous giving and taking of care. The global feminist struggle for affordable and fit-for-purpose housing bridges second-wave feminist critiques of the gendered labour of social reproduction with the subsequent emergence of care as a pressing intersectional feminist issue. Rather than a straightforward denouncement of dwelling along with patriarchal domesticity, I argue that feminist art, activism, and their multiple intersections continue to revisit and sometimes recover home-making to activate its potential for nurturing feminist subjects.

This is an Accepted Manuscript of a book chapter published by Routledge/CRC Press in Feminist Visual Activism and the Body on 31/12/2020, available online: http://www.routledge.com/9780367278991 or http://www.crcpress.com/9780429298615