Feminist Archival Practices and Transmission: A Conversation at NEST
At the NEST: Network for Empowerment, Solidarity, and Transregionality gathering in Paris, the Women’s Art Register had only three minutes to answer a big question—but our committee member Merren Ricketson made it count!
In that short time, she delivered a powerful response on feminist archival practices and knowledge transmission, showcasing W.A.R.’s deep-rooted commitment to archiving, education, and advocacy. Her insights cut through the noise, reinforcing why feminist-led archives matter and how they continue to shape histories that might otherwise be lost.
“Could you outline your experience, from the 1970s to today, in creating pedagogical tools using the archive to build a more inclusive educational system, and support professional practice strategies for artists, educators, and art & museum industry professionals?”
Education is central to our work!
Next year the Women's Art Register, an artist-run, volunteer organisation in Melbourne, Australia, will celebrate its 50th anniversary. Since 1975 we have documented, archived, conserved, published, expanded our archive and planned events around our collections.
This represents 1000s and 1000s of hours of passionate, committed, feminist work by women on our Committees and countless volunteers over 50 years.
In our tiny cramped office (pointing to image above) we hold archives of over 5000 artists who identify as women or gender diverse, and are Australian based. The earliest artist represented is Theresa Walker who lived 1804 - 1878. Of course our indigenous history means we are missing a great deal before this ....
Access and use of the collection is key. It is used by researchers, academics, students, educators, curators, historians and museum staff.
In the 70s and 80s getting material into schools and onto the syllabus was our main aim. Art textbooks used in Australian classrooms and the curriculum of art history courses in tertiary colleges included very few women artists, or as usually was the case, none at all.
Over a decade we produced 6 education resource kits, comprising slides and information booklets which were sold across Australia.The artists selected were major professional artists all respected in their fields.
(Showing the kit) I know this is very old technology now but at the time these resources were very significant. The most significant came out of a collaboration with Indigenous, Koorie artists from the Kulin nations - who live in the south-east of Australia. This kit includes interviews with artists speaking directly to students.
Through the years we also sent slides by individual artists across the country to schools and art institutions: museums and galleries.
In this way we were slowly redressing the neglect and invisibility in both curriculum content and in museum and gallery exhibition programs, and supporting and promoting our artists.
Today our work in the educational sphere continues as does our public education programs. In 2021 my colleague (pointing) Caroline Phillips initiated the ‘Leaving Your Legacy’ project . There are no structures and very little information, in particular for older women artists, to prepare and ensure their own legacies. This workbook provides legal, taxation, copyright and conservation information for artists to manage their professional practice and estate planning.
You can check out our work on our website. I certainly hope you do. Merci!
Do you want to know more about the event?
Read the report from Merren Ricketson: https://www.womensartregister.org/blog/war-in-paris