Storyboard / Photography as a Revolutionary Act

Back to Storyboard Posts

Photography as a Revolutionary Act

Photographer Meadow Muska sheds light on her rare, illustrative, and affirming photographs and her life

June 11, 2018

Back to the Land

photo by Meadow Muska. All Rights Reserved.

 
TPT’s Out North: MNLGBTQ History documentary features an array of archival visual materials by and about the LGBTQ community. TPT was fortunate to be able to include photographs captured by Meadow Muska that bring to life the lesbian feminist experiences of the 1970’s era.

What inspired you to pick up a camera?

Back to the Land
Credit: Meadow Muska. All Rights Reserved.

As a female, my career choices in the early ’70s were limited. I earned a BFA in photography as a way to express myself and create a new realty.

Lesbians photographing lesbians were rare, and it was revolutionary that I controlled the process. Sending film to the drugstore for developing and printing could expose women to judgement or actually be confiscated.

Trust was key. Being identified as a lesbian could cause loss of job, children, or housing. My intention was to keep the identities of the women safe, as I have done for 40 years.

In Oregon, I emptied semi-trucks by hand as day labor to pay for film, chemicals, and paper. In Minnesota, I dug out a partial basement with 2 buckets and a shovel to make a darkroom, and breathed dangerous chemicals in a small space to develop and print in color.

I captured my life and friends. I lived in the cities for work and education. I traveled to festivals and women’s land on the weekends for emotional and spiritual healing. I was not interested in the bars. Alcohol was expensive and dancing started late at night. I had to get up early to go to work or school.

Your photos capture the power of women’s spaces in the back-to-the-land movement. Why was this important to you?

I used my camera to show what I saw: beautiful strong women with love and joy. This was revolutionary. Lesbians were seen as a danger to society and children. I felt safe and empowered on women’s land.

In the midst of the #MeToo, what can young women learn from your work and your generation?

Some of us have been fighting for social justice for fifty years. We may look like “little old ladies” of little value in this culture, but we have knowledge, experience, networks, and we want to pass the baton to people of conscience and courage, as did the women
before us. We are all standing on the shoulders of those who sacrificed.

HEAR MORE FROM MEADOW

© Twin Cities Public Television - 2018. All rights reserved.

Comments

Read Next

Top
To Top