Raised in Tijuana, Mexico and educated in the United States, visual artist and designer Tanya Aguiñiga's unique, cross-cultural craft work combines activist and community-based art practices, connecting marginalized communities through creative collaboration and inspiring audiences across the country and beyond its borders to engage in critical conversations about identity, gender, and culture.
A staple of the Los Angeles alt-comedy scene, transgender comedian Riley Silverman brings the house down by raising consciousness, delivering sharp, silly, and darkly humorous takes (inspired by her own experience) on topics like transitioning, harassment, and #TravelingWhileTrans.
Inspired by the fashion needs of both its founder and the larger LGBTQ community, designer Nik Kacy formed Nik Kacy Gender Equal Footwear, a groundbreaking shoe company specializing in the creation of stylish, uniquely unisex footwear for individuals of all gender expressions, paving the way for all people to rock what's in their hearts and souls on their feet without being (shoe)boxed in a gender binary.
With Call Your Girlfriend, a biweekly, unapologetically feminist podcast discussing the latest in pop culture and politics, journalist Ann Friedman and real-life bestie Amina Sow invite listeners to eavesdrop on their phone calls to each other about everything from menstrual cycles to workplace dramas, shattering the tired stereotype of catty and competitive female friendship and shining a bright, powerful light on the bond of sisterhood.
Blending bright colors, playful humor, and fierce feminism, illustrator Mary Purdie's gal-powered gallery of pop culture's most iconic feminist sheroes has drawn thousands of Instagram followers, inspiring meaningful activism and healing laughter through her artwork, while waving a middle finger (or two!) in the patriarchy's face.
Slam poetry superstar and teaching artist Alyesha Wise puts into powerful words her experiences as a black woman, calling out white supremacist patriarchy with her poetry and inspiring the next generation of poet-activists.
Using hair as a form of social justice, queer hairstylist Madin Ray Lopez's non-profit organization, Project Q, transforms LGBTQIA and homeless youth by helping those struggling to accept who they are become the people they were born to be - one haircut at a time!
Drawing from her coming-of-age as the child of an Italian immigrant, the othering she encountered as a city kid residing in the rural South, and her experience as an immigrant living and working abroad, LA-based visual artist Debra Scacco creates multimedia artwork that charts a course towards understanding cultural identity (including her own), exploring "placelessness" and pinpointing personal history as a port of entry for continual investigation of geography and environment.
Whether she's writing about queer politics, racial justice, or rape culture, writer, activist, and social media maven Carmen Rios reigns queen supreme of the feminist blogosphere, overseeing the development of safe spaces centering the feminine narrative as Managing Editor at Argot Magazine; reporting, rebelling, and truth-telling as Digital Editor at Ms.; and activating young women by melding fandom and social culture with current political issues as Co-Host of THE BOSSY SHOW podcast.
Indie-folk goddesses Elana Stone and Katie Wighton, together with their "sisters" Hannah Crofts and Georgia Mooney, cast a potent spell as All Our Exes Live In Texas, a fierce, musical foursome mixing masterful musicianship, heavenly harmonies, and a little feminism for good measure.
Embodying different Bettys colliding at the intersections of anger, sex, and "thea-tah", actors Anna Lamadrid, Tracey A. Leigh, and Elyse Mirto deliver a knockout blow to a thousand boring tropes about female identity in The Theatre @ Boston Court's production of Jen Silverman's brash, uncompromising, queer comedy Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Boops.
In That'swhatshesaid, a one-person performance using only female dialogue from the most-produced plays in America, performance artist Erin Pike acts out a brutal theatrical exercise in isolation, inviting audiences to observe the chaos and clarity that emerges when female characters are left alone with no male protagonists to support.
Tired of waiting for permission to screen her own films and desiring a safe space for feminist filmmakers and their movies to shine, indie auteur and actor Premstar Santana founded the Moonfaze Feminist Film Festival, an annual celebration of films that foreground a feminist viewpoint and showcase critical, political, cinematic takes on the many levels of oppression women, queer people, and people of color navigate every day.
In her new, semi-autobiographical television pilot Binge, actor and series creator Angela Gulner stars as Angela, a bulimic woman who drunkenly enrolls in eating disorder rehab where she must juggle her failing pastry shop, an affair with her therapist, and a cast of bizarre food-abusers, all while trying not to do what she does best: vomit.
Inspired by Susan J. Brison's book Aftermath about violent trauma and the body, visual artist and feminist Nancy Baker Cahill's current body of work SURDS features small and large-scale drawings that merge her interpretation of the human body as a complicated abstraction engaged in perpetual struggle with a mathematical concept in order to explore the human "rational" desire for understanding through order and logic, even when faced with a nonsensical act like sexual assault.
Fiercely intelligent and wildly funny feminist performance artist Kristina Wong takes on Tila Tequila's viral appeal, the highs and lows of trolling Donald Trump and his alt-right acolytes on Twitter, and the challenges of creating political theatre in a world where performance art and "real life" are increasingly becoming one and the same.
Co-editor of The Feminist Utopia Project and playwright Rachel Kauder Nalebuff's radical work-in-progress play production, The Bumps, probes how we make meaning as we wait, casting pregnant performers at various stages of pregnancy and combining narrative and movement to chart how our understanding of motherhood has evolved.
By organizing women-led music festivals, devising educational programming in music, and amplifying the voices of women and girls who rock, musicians Anna Bulbrook (GIRLSCHOOL) and Mona Tavakoli (Rock n' Roll Camp for Girls LA) turn up the volume on feminist activism, fostering an empowering and supportive community of women-identified rockers.
Through her exploratory workshop Feminist Acting Class, presented as part of The Hammer Museum's Bureau of Feminism initiative, queer feminist playwright, director, musician, and performer Gina Young hopes to expand the roles for women and non binary people in the theatre by providing a space free from restrictive gender expectations for performers to experiment with roles that would otherwise be off-limits.
With Instagram account Bye Felipe, feminist journalist-cum-Tinder vigilante Alexandra Tweten calls out dudes online who turn hostile when rejected or ignored by inviting women to screenshot the harassing messages they receive when they tell men they're not interested.
As artistic director of Chicago's The Viola Project, professional actor and teaching artist Skyler Schrempp cultivates confidence among middle school-aged girls by creating "a brave space" for young women to stand up, advocate for themselves, and demand inclusion through creative exploration of William Shakespeare's classic plays.
Chicago-based storyteller, educator, and sex positivity activist Alicia Swiz takes on takes on rape culture, slut shaming, and media's role in influencing our attitudes about women and sexuality.
Writer, producer, and co-creator of Amazon Prime's new animated series Danger and Eggs Shadi Petosky talks internalized transphobia, intersectional feminism, and the importance of recognizing our biases (and f***ing destroying them!).
For playwright Ellen Fairey and director Kimberly Senior, aging and ageism, the evolution of gender roles, and the need for safe spaces to express our anxieties about an ever-changing world take center stage in the Goodman Theatre's New Stages Festival production ofSupport Group for Men.
Actors Bri Sudia and Lauren Molina, in collaboration with Tony Award-winning director Mary Zimmerman, set the scene for sisterhood both on and off stage in the Goodman Theatre's production of Leonard Bernstein's classic musical Wonderful Town.