MARY KELLY
SINCE 2014, I have been making a series of works in compressed lint based on the covers of 7 Days, a short-lived, left-leaning weekly newspaper from the early 1970s. For me, this slice of the past captures the collective aspirations and missed possibilities of a generation formed by the events of May ’68, a social revolution that set the legal precedents and inspired the personal transformations associated with the present-day notion of identity politics. Succeeding generations seem to have an intuitive knowledge of the consequences of these events, a lived relation to the past that is practical rather than historical. In the 7 Days project, I am trying to map this generational transference as well as the meaning of an era defined by the legacy of ’68. The process of reproducing archival images in the lint medium is concerned with affect as much as fact. Individual units are cast in the filter screen of a domestic dryer, over several months and hundreds of washing cycles, then assembled as a single work.
Referencing Picture Post, a periodical published in the UK from 1938 to 1957, and similar in design to Life magazine in the US, 7 Days used jobbing news photographers and reporters who were also activists to create alternative coverage to the established narrative of current events. But unlike any of its predecessors, 7 Days was founded by an alliance of women who were engaged in feminist politics, as well as men involved in the self-styled revolutionary politics of the time. As a consequence, the newspaper aimed to establish parity in the production process and give full support to the Women’s Liberation Movement. Launched in October 1971, 7 Days ran for less than a year, until May 1972. During that time, I contributed articles and illustrations to several issues. One of my most memorable experiences was working on issue 19, March 8–14, 1972. The cover photo by Rex Features was taken at the international abortion march in Paris in November 1971. In the foreground, two women strut arm in arm. One makes a provocative gesture, exposing the photographer’s complicit voyeurism. Now there would be no turning back, no holds barred. Other photos in this issue document Simone de Beauvoir’s participation in the demonstration and illustrate an extensive interview with her, in which she delivers the famous lines, “Today, I’ve changed. I’ve really become a feminist,” referring to her shift in position since writing The Second Sex (1949). Rather than assuming that women would be liberated after the socialist revolution, in 7 Days, she suggests that an independent struggle for emancipation would be necessary. For many of us, this was a life-changing event—the formative moment of a political identity, understood as a movement that was “separate, but not autonomous,” that acknowledged our commitment to the broader struggle for social change, and at the same time insisted on making sexuality pass into that grand narrative unscathed.
Mary Kelly is an artist based in Los Angeles.
