Ahead of our ‘Feminism in the Arts‘ event, co-hosted with Ainslie and Gorman Arts Centres, we’re featuring profiles with our speakers! Today, meet Hannah de Feyter – musician and co-founder of COUP Canberra.
Tell us a bit about yourself and the type of art you make.
My name is Hannah, and I’m part of an experimental arts collective called COUP which I started last year with my brilliant friends Cathy Petocz and Becki Whitton. Our current project is a play called Vinegar Tom, written by the great feminist playwright Caryl Churchill. The play is about witches,or maybe more accurately witch hunts, and it features some really deep actors and experimental musicians. I’m working as a producer and sound designer on the project. I also make weird viola music by myself as Alphamale and with Becki as Cilt, and I’m currently editing a documentary feature.
When did you first identify as a feminist?
I feel like I identified as a feminist late, which was mostly to do with the environment I grew up in, like I remember being this seventeen-year-old at Christian school writing real zealous essays about gender roles being super important. I’m always trying to treat that misguided younger self with gentleness and humour in my mind, and I guess a lot of the work I make is trying to deal with her too. Anyway, I started identifying as a feminist while at uni in about 2009 and started incorporating some of those ideas into my art practice/life a couple of years later.
I feel like I identified as a feminist late, which was mostly to do with the environment I grew up in, like I remember being this seventeen-year-old at Christian school writing real zealous essays about gender roles being super important. I’m always trying to treat that misguided younger self with gentleness and humour in my mind, and I guess a lot of the work I make is trying to deal with her too. Anyway, I started identifying as a feminist while at uni in about 2009 and started incorporating some of those ideas into my art practice/life a couple of years later.
What’s the key way you think feminism can improve or add to your work?
Feminism is honestly the thing that’s allowed me to have real relationships with other women, so mostly the answer has to be collaborating with women! I feel like the influence feminist thinking has had on my priorities is helping me to build collaborative structures that feel good to inhabit, particularly for the work I’m doing with COUP which has such a large group of people involved.
Who is a feminist artist you admire?
Louise Bourgeois, Ava DuVernay, Kelly Reichardt, Chris Kraus.
You can hear more from Hannah at our upcoming event, ‘Feminism in the arts’, at 7pm Thursday 10 November, Gorman Arts Centre Main Hall. More details are on Facebook.