|
These photos by Jean Taylor are of the Archives room in the Women's Liberation Building situated at 295 Victoria Street West Melbourne during the 1980s.
|
Victorian Women’s Liberation and Lesbian Feminist
Archives Inc
Association Incorporation Act 1981 no A0040374W
ABN 61 138 628 062
PO Box 168, Brunswick East
Melbourne, Victoria 3057
phone: 03 9387 6610
email: vwllfa@gmail.com
|
| |
| What We Do |
| After the Archives moved to the University of
Melbourne Archives, where the substantial amount
material has been appropriately housed in temperature
controlled conditions ever since, the VWLLFA
collective members have continued to work on the
material. The Collective still takes its custodial
role seriously and has not only helped to maintain the
collection but has also applied for and received
several grants over these past number of years. |
| Three grants from the Community Heritage Grants
Scheme in Canberra over a four year period (2000, 2001
and 2003) enabled us, first of all, to have the
collection assessed by The Ian Potter Art Conservation
Centre. Their findings were written up in a report,
Conservation and Survey Management Plan 2001, which
showed that the collection was worthy of being
preserved and gave recommendations about what work
needed to be done to protect and maintain the various
items. With the second grant we were able to buy a map
drawer to store most of our many hundreds of posters.
And the third grant allowed us to purchase acid-free
storage materials, like large boxes for memorabilia,
plastic storage bags for the posters and tissue paper
for the banners and teeshirts. |
| The collective received a grant in 2001 from Lesbians
Inc (LINC) in Sydney to add to, but by no means
finish, the detailed listings of the collection during
2002. We successfully applied for a grant from the
National Fountation of Australian Women (NFAW) in
Canberra in 2003, to write up the short biographies of
the activists who have donated material as well as the
herstorical details of the defunct collectives in the
collection. We received a small grant from ALSO /
AUSSIE in 2005 to bind some of the precious Women’s
Liberation, Lesbian and Feminist Socialist
newsletters, newspapers, magazines and journals with
distinctive purple covers. Most recently, we were able
to set up this website with another grant from LINC
(2007). |
| Of course, applying for and getting the money was one
thing, putting it to practical use quite another.
Since the beginning of 2001, members of the collective
have not only been meeting on a regular basis but they
have been doing volunteer work on a regular one day a
week basis at UMA to do whatever’s necessary to
maintain and preserve this unique collection. |
| This has involved several different strategies: |
| The typing up of the bios so that we now have a
substantial biographical listing of most of the
activists from the 1970s in particular, who they were
and what they did, and the background details of the
collectives that were active back then. These bios
have been placed in the appropriate boxes of all the
individual donors and collectives as a record. (If
anyone who donated material hasn’t sent in their bio
as yet this is your reminder to do so). |
| All the photos have been put into approximately 15 or
so acid-free photo albums. This is not a comprehensive
collection as most activists are understandably still
holding onto their personal photos but it’s a start. |
| Before storing all the badges according to provenance
in albums, we sorted them into related issues, which
means we have a collection that probably reflects most
of the issues and actions of the early WLM years in
particular, including many of the ones made on
badge-making machines as fundraisers. |
| The teeshirts and the textile memorabilia, like a
clown costume from the Performing Older Women’s Circus
and items from the Cockburn Sound Action in WA in
1984, were photographed front and back before being
stored flat between acid-free tissue paper in
acid-free boxes. Again these are an invaluabe record
of the many gatherings, performances, demos and
conferences feminists and lesbians participated in. |
| To photograph all the approximately eighty large
banners for documentation purposes before they were
rolled up, the photographer had to stand on a ladder
and the banners had to be taped to the railings of a
staircase and even them some of them were so large
they had to be photographed in two pieces. The
banners were then laid flat on a very long table in
the front room of UMA before being very carefully
rolled one at a time onto PVC pipe to hold them stable
and at the same time wrapped in very long pieces of
acid-free tissue paper. We then tied them with cotton
tape, labelled them with the message and the name of
the donor and took carried them out the back to store
them in rows on the tops of the filing cabinets. |
| As we put all of the hundreds of posters back-to-back
into acid-free plastic bags according to size and
provenance they were listed and listed before being
stored flat in convenient stacks in our newly-acquired
map drawer. |
| Binding the publications, so they could be made more
accessible and at the same time ensure their
preservation, involved quite a bit of work beforehand.
We had to gather all the copies of the different
newsletters and magazines, choose the best issues, put
them in order and thenmake sure there were back-up
copies before sending them off to the binder. Some of
these publications such as the Lesbian Newsletter
(1976 - 1983), Lesbian News (1983 - 1990), Melbourne
Women’s Liberation Newsletter (1972 - 1984) and
Victorian Women’s Liberation Newsletter (1986 - 1994)
had never been in one place in chronological order
before. So that was exciting in itself. |
| We were able to get the Lesbian Newsletter, the
Lesbian News and Labrys (1990 - 1992), bound with the
grant. And thanks to donations of Lesbiana from the
three Editors, Sheril Berkovitch (1992 - 1995), Jan
Campbell (1995 - 2000) and Jude Dennis (2000 - 2004),
topped up by the odd copy in the Archives and a last
minute donation, we have also been able to bind one
complete set of Lesbiana as well as a set each of
Vashti’s Voice / Vashti (1972 - 1981) and Scarlet
Woman (1975 - 1990). |
| We’re still in the process of storing all the rest of
memorabilia, such as a pair of soccer boots from the
Fairfield Falcons and the comprehensive resource file
from Women’s Liberation Switchboard, as well the few
videos, films and tapes in the collection into
acid-free boxes. |
| It usually took several months to do any one of these
projects and while it was all extremely time-consuming
the work was also immensely satisfying. |
| So next time any of you are doing your PhD thesis on
lesbian feminist activism (keeping in mind that
general lesbian material can be found in the
Australian Lesbian and Gay Archives) or doing research
on any issue to do with the Women’s Liberation
Movement from 1969 onwards or just have a general
interest in any of this material for your own benefit,
just remember that the VWL&LF Archives can be accessed
through the Baillieu Library at Melbourne Uni. |
| |
The copyright for all material on this site is held by the Victorian Womens' Liberation and Lesbian Feminist Archives Inc. (2009 - 2010)
