The HATCHED2021 exhibition at OVADA brings together the practices of local and international lens-based artists. Collectively these artists voice the multiple aspects of gender inequalities: reproductive rights, gender-based violence, and trafficking. This work is shown alongside artists whose attention is closer to home. The tender look at motherhood, an exploration of complex family experiences. Personal and global they share an intimate female gaze.

Private view: Thursday 4 November: 5 to 8 pm. Pay bar

HATCHED is a creative platform promoting and sharing work addressing women’s issues and experiences that range from ‘The personal is political' to Human Rights. HATCHED was set up in 2016 by Maga Esberg and has been part of the Oxford International Women's Festival since then.

2020-2021 has brought challenges to all; the COVID-19 pandemic, Brexit, and the pressure of climate change on the environment. However, a girl born in late 2021 will automatically join the ranks of the 4 billion females worldwide whose daily reality is shaped by gender inequality in one form or another.

The Women Creating Landscapes exhibition at OVADA brings together the practices of local and international lens-based artists. Collectively these artists voice the multiple aspects of gender inequalities: reproductive rights, gender-based violence, and trafficking. This work is shown alongside artists whose attention is closer to home: a tender look at motherhood, an exploration of complex family experiences. Personal and global they share an intimate female gaze.

The artists in HATCHED2021 aim to be part of the ongoing dialogue on equality, to communicate their concerns, and to make a positive difference. These works don't stand alone; they are part of a bigger movement of women globally intent on being heard and seen.

Agnese Mūrniece’s video 'Bivouac' is inspired by childhood memories and social movements in Latvia.
Alice Brookes’s video ‘Three weeks in Lockdown’, 2020 was inspired by Suzanne Lacy's project, Three Weeks in May 1977.
Alison Kahn and Avi Zhimo explore ‘The Secret Museum of Anthropology’ published in 1935.
Beatrix Haxby’s video ‘The Mutinous-Feminine’ is part gymnastics performance, part examination of beauty.
Fiona Yaron-Field’s series ‘Belongings’ explores the surviving mementos from trafficked women.
Gaby Venus’s triptych ‘Cathy, can you hear me?’ looks at absence, homelessness, and family dynamics.
Jenny Wylie looks at the ubiquitous work of Margaret Calvert. Karen Toro’s ‘It is law’ looks at women's rights and freedom in Ecuador.
Maga Esberg’s series ‘Barbe bleu’ looks at the impact of patriarchy from an oblique angle.
Marcia Michael’s ‘Before Memory Returns’ is a series of self-portraits reflecting varying emotions heightened at night, in solace.
Miranda Gavin uses photography, text, and film to create work that embraces experimentation, often focusing on themes of love, abuse, and betrayal.
Mita Vaghela’s practice centers on questioning her social heritage and the value of the female in Hindu culture.
Nia Walling’s exploration is seated in the politics of ecofeminism and menstrual reclamation.
Rosie Barnes’s ‘No You’re Not’ is a portrait project about autistic women.
Sarah Lawton’s film portrays a journey into motherhood from an extremely high-risk pregnancy, throughout NICU and beyond.
Susan Andrews considers her relationship with her mother and the strange collection of objects that have travelled through time to connect them.
Yara Richter’s no-budget poetry short film 'Tired of Trees?' depicts a young, black mother’s experience of the first COVID-19 lockdown in a German suburb.

About the Curator:
Maga Esberg is a visual artist, tutor and curator based in the UK. She set up HATCHED as a creative platform to share work addressing women’s issues and experiences that range from ‘The personal is political' to Human Rights. HATCHED has been exhibiting as part of the Oxford International Women festival since 2016 at the North Wall gallery, the Jam Factory, Common Ground working space and Freud in Oxford.