the pop-up exhibition opens…

Space Gallery, 7 Old High Street, Folkestone CT20 1RJ

Open Wednesdays to Sundays, 11am-5pm until 12 March 2017

“The Older Women Rock! Exhibition opened at Space Gallery Folkestone last night – do go see it, it’s genuinely brilliant and the clothes/artwork are beautiful, funny, challenging, and make you think. Leah Thorn‘s vision for women’s liberation permeates all the work, which is a combination of hers and older women collaborators (including the wonderfully named Profanity Embroidery Group). Well worth a trip to Folkestone – think of it as a Triennial Taster!”

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zumba gold flashmob…

‘Older Women Rock!’ rocked Bouverie Place Shopping Centre, Folkestone to promote the project –

screen

A burnt leather jacket by the fabulous fashion designer and stylist, Claire Angel

don’t my breasts count?

a bra top embellished by Leah…

don’t my breasts count?

Women between the ages of 50 and 70 are invited for breast screening as part of the NHS Breast Screening Programme. There has been a recommendation to remove the upper age limit as more than half of the 12,000 women who die from breast cancer a year are over 70.

‘Older Women Rock!’ rock

Rhubarb & custard flavour rock sweets that will be distributed around Folkestone to promote ‘Older Women Rock!’

 

in my day…

Embroidery by Allie Lee, interpreting my poem, ‘In my day’ –

In my day, stockings came in black, bronze and American Tan.

Opening a bank account needed the signature of a man.

Vintage was plain old secondhand. Girdles held in sexual urges,

touching below the waist was no-go and Dusty passed as hetero.

There was no such thing as pubic hair wax and you daren’t use Tampax

or have a sexual climax for fear of being thought nymphomaniacs.

In my day, women were men’s property. There was no Equal Pay Act

till 1970. In the media Black women were only portrayed as maids

or African Royalty. Women had no rights to a husband’s pay,

‘housewife’ was a synonym for female, rape in marriage was

legally OK. To get the Birth Control Pill you had to be married

or you had to lie. In my day, abortion was a crime.

Nowadays a lesbian label can be a fashion accessory,

while gender binary is so last century. Nowadays we’re sold

sexploitation and feminisms of choice in the guise of liberation.

Nowadays age-defying procedures make us older women pixel perfect.

Because We’re Worth It. Nowadays, liberation is distorted into

fifty shades of grey and what was once hard-core porn is now

matter-of-fact everyday. So I navigate nowadays,

excavate my day,  my day is nowadays. ‘In my day’ is NOW

  

 

 

lines are one sign I’ve survived

Felt & embroidery artist Jan Lewis of the Profanity Embroidery Group interprets my poem, ‘lines’ –

Lines come from frowning, from genes of course,

from antidepressants and from divorce, from

free radicals, from rays of the sun, from sleeping

on your face and going for a run, drinking from

a bottle repetitively, from diet and pollution and

chewing gum excessively, from denying age-defying

cream, from smiling, from squinting, from inhaling

nicotine, from alcohol [in excess], from drugs,

from grumbling and from too little sex. Yet lines

are one sign I’ve survived. My lines equal ageing.

Anti-ageing equals anti-life. My lines will go, the moment I die

 

STOP PRESS ‘Older Women Rock!’ has been flagged up as one of ‘the best literature projects with older adults’

https://literature.britishcouncil.org/blog/2016/monday-blog-literary-projects-with-older-adults/

Crowdfunder unique rewards!

Please share and pledge to this exciting project….One-off ‘Older Women Rock!’ brooches and necklace, Crowdfunder rewards are moving off the shelve fast so be sure to secure yours at:

http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/older-women-rock-1

another beautiful piece of poetry clothing

Here is the wonderful Annie Taylor of the Profanity Embroidery Group, wearing the mohair sweater she embroidered with my ‘Older Women Rock!’ poem –

Chin troubled

by prickly stubble?

Shave it

Pluck it

Laser it

Fuck it

 

older women & the beauty industry

An amazing embroidery by Allie Lee of the Profanity Embroidery Group interpreting my poem, ‘cream’

The beauty industry screams Buy This Cream.

Stay Young, Be Happy, perpetual happiness

by virtue of a billion pound industry

that drip drip feeds the need for chemical warfare,

for cosmeceutical skin care to hydrate,

replenish, regenerate. Got taut, tight skin?

You’re in. Got ticking clocks? Botox  Detox.

Resist signs of ageing at all cost.

Stop. Reverse. Hide. Slo mo. Smooth your skin ego.

Feel the urge for a youth surge?

Want a victory of science over time?

Want to reignite your youthful light?

Deny age. Defy age. Youthful looking eyes are in sight

with caprylic triglyceride. Uplift with palmotoyl oligopeptide.

You’re in control with phenoxyethanol.

Replump with sodium phytate. No. Retaliate, fight age hate.

It’s a diabolical conspiracy for women to age agelessly,

line-, scar-, blemish-, crease-free.

I refuse to let the forever-young drug

                       erase the handwriting of life across my face

inspired by  ‘Out of Time’ by Lynne Segal, ‘How to Age’ by Anne Karpf and Boots beauty counter