Olivia Plender
Olivia Plender (b. 1977, United Kingdom, lives and works in Stockholm and London) builds her artworks on social history, and frequently investigates the relationship between gender, power and authority. Plender’s practice includes drawings, installations, videos and performances, as well as teaching.
Plender recently co-curated the exhibition Chronos: Health, Access and Intimacy at Tensta Konsthall in Stockholm, and her own work has been exhibited worldwide at museums and biennials such as the 16th Sharjah Biennial; Kalmar konstmuseum; Zacheta – National Gallery of Art, Warsaw; Centre Pompidou-Metz; 34th Sao Paulo Biennial; Glasgow Women’s Library; 9th Gothenburg International Biennial; 6th Taipei Biennial; Manifesta 8, Murcia; Tate Britain, London; Hessel Museum of Art, CCS Bard, New York; MoMA PS1, New York. Plender holds a PhD in Fine Art from Lund University and Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm.
Hold Hold Fire
2019
Two-channel video installation, 11 min 36 sec
Courtesy of the artist and Maureen Paley, London
Olivia Plender’s work draws on research into pedagogical methods and revolutionary, social, political, and religious movements of the 19th and 20th centuries. Her practice explores feminist and grassroots movements through both historical and contemporary lenses, focusing on protest, uprising, and women’s empowerment. In this video a group of women participate in a self-defence workshop, practicing jiu-jitsu throws and stances. Their movements culminate in a reenactment of a 1914 photograph of The People’s Army – a self-defence unit of the East London Federation of the Suffragettes (ELFS) – posing with rifles in a public park in London. The final scene unfolds as a tableau vivant in front of a painted theatrical backdrop, evoking the style of a living history painting.
Arrest!
2021
9 drawings, 21 × 29,7 cm each
Courtesy of the artist and Maureen Paley, London
The pencil drawing series Arrest! is based on early 20th-century press photographs of suffragettes being violently arrested by police. In these works, the women’s faces are rendered with detail and individuality, whereas the identities of the men are masked by their uniforms. This visual strategy underscores the erasure of state agents and highlights the enduring presence of resistance. The repetition of arrest scenes evokes contemporary protests and the ongoing struggle against institutional violence.
Neither Strivers Nor Skivers, They Will Not Define Us
2020
Series of posters, 59,4 × 84 cm each
Courtesy of the artist and Maureen Paley, London
This series of posters is part of the project Neither Strivers Nor Skivers, They Will Not Define Us, inspired by Olivia Plender’s research into the British socialist feminist and anti-fascist figure Sylvia Pankhurst (1882-1960). After Plender found Pankhurst’s play Liberty or Death from 1913 in the archives of the Women’s Library in London, without any reference to it ever having been performed or published, she let the script be a starting point for meetings with grassroot activists in women’s centres in London. The posters and the video installation Hold Hold Fire, among other things, sprung from these meetings, that allowed activism and feminism from the last century to intertwine with the concerns of feminist organisers today.