Critical Writing Index

Portrait of the Practice and Trends Among Feminist Videomakers, in Quebec

by Diane Poitras

Video Guide, Oct. 1984, v. 6, no. 5, p. 11

Poitras conducts interviews with women from three Quebec collectives: Video-Femmes, the G.I.V., and Les productions actions feministes par l'image, as well as independent artists Francoise Dugre, Ann Ramsden, and Lynda Pierce, to determine attitudes toward the technical side of the medium, changes in content, and evolution in form. Poitras concludes that while women are no longer intimidated by technology and many are mastering sound, lighting and camera, attitudes are ambiguous when confronted with ever changing advances in technology. New technology requires an on-going apprenticeship with new tools and brings to the forefront the harsh reality of cost.

In the early 1970s feminists felt the urgent desire to cover issues such as abortion, contraception, sexual violence, but now in addition to those issues, women want to expand the language of their works and involve subjects such as organizing work in the office, nuclear energy, women and culture, women and aging. Productions are becoming less urgent, less demanding, and more interrogative, more reflective with a goal of attaining higher levels of aesthetic quality.

ITEM 1984.152 – available for viewing in the Research Centre