Nice mandalas with the blood of menstruation, comic books full of humor and claims, photographs of women with blotches of menopause, a novel about a menopause woman... Feminist creators have worked on the topic of menstruation in a thousand ways; at the exhibition ‘Hilekoa gorria ote’ they have invited to know these works and to reflect on the taboos that have been built upon the return of menstruation.

The exhibition coordinator is Ainhoa Aldazabal Gallastegi. The Eibarrés philologist is a member of the Skolastika programme, dedicated to women, culture and literature, and has been collecting creative works on menstruation for five years and teaching courses on literature and menstruation. The exhibition will be in the culture house of the Biscay town until March 29.

We with the bodies that are ours

How do we live the rule? How has society made us live? “We thought that our bodies are ugly, that we only need them to give birth, that they are incomprehensible. Dirty.” Whether they are mortal or not, many people have internalized this reading of patriarchy. Feminism has worked against these myths and false beliefs, and artists and writers have made many contributions to break taboos; as Aldazabal has pointed out in the exhibition “the stigmatized bodies need their own tools to talk about the bodies that are ours”.

In a panel of the exhibition they summarized the message that patriarchy has given us about menstruation: “The rule is 28 days. It lasts 4 days. It is very normal for there to be pain in the days before the month. Beware of men. After the first month you can become pregnant. Therefore, after the first month you are already a woman.” Menopause and disease, for example, have been taboo in taboos.

As explained by Ainhoa Aldazabal, Erika Irusta attended a course of menstruation pedagogue, with the objective of deepening the subject. In the exhibition, the messages of the patriarchy have been ignored and attention has been drawn to the experiences themselves, in line with what Irusta informs. In an area of the room, it is proposed to observe the cycles of menstruation, as the bodies of women can provide a lot of information: “Some of us will be cyclical, and in addition to the bloodshed, we will represent in the diagrams the hormonal dance that is our body. Others don’t.” In addition, on an exhibition computer you can read how several women from Elorrio remember their first month. Aldazabal explains that he starts his workshops with this question: “I haven’t found anyone who doesn’t remember the first time; they’ve all marked us in some way and yet rarely ask us about it,” a sign that it’s a taboo.

Wall of scandals

To highlight that menstruation is a subject that must be hidden in society, the exhibition shows some situations that are taboos through photographs: a swimmer with a month, a tabernacle - a woman who works in public - with a blot of blood in the pants, a masturbation with a month, a cup to collect blood in the bathrooms from outside the home... Aldazabal has warned that the mere display of the taboo outrages us, which is why they have called this exhibition space “Wall of the scandal”.

Following these scandalous images of society, the member of Skolastika recalled the words of Erika Irusta: “In this culture, what does harm is menstruation, not menstruation itself.” Also in Irusta’s interview to the Light he said: “(...) you realize that the problem or what is wrong is not your hormones or your body, but that misogynistic look inherited. That’s why it’s hard to have a month in this society.”

Menstrual borders yet

After a reflection on the taboos, the exhibition brings together works by feminist artists and writers, who have participated in the exhibition. They have received works of all kinds: humor to break taboos through comics (Lola Vendetta, Regina Dibina); eye-catching performances such as the work of the artist Casey Jenkins who buffered for 28 days with corn wool; and paintings with menstrual blood, such as the “Menguante” by Zanele Mandmuholi in South Africa. Zanele Muholi is a lesbian artist and activist who struggles to discover hidden and punished worlds in South Africa.

In their literary works, they have collected numerous significant passages and views from non-menopausal women such as Miren Agur Meabe, from Ojo Cristalino, and The intense heat of the moon, from Gioconda Belli; Without hunger, from Delphine De vigan, where a woman with anorexia reports her disappearance. These texts touch various edges of menstruation. As Aldazabal explained, depending on the context, the fact of lowering or not menstruation can give joy, sadness, shame... It's not the same for anyone who wants to get pregnant, who's sick, who's been raped.

The exhibition has also enabled spaces to read and watch videos: to sit down and enjoy the peace of mind of seeing novels, essays, comics, magazines, documentaries, video blogs and reports. A catalogue with a great content of materials has also been drawn up, as there are creations of different perspectives. And it is that, as they have stressed, “we have been led to believe that there is only one way to live the rule. But the experience of the menstrual period is varied, not absolute, changing and not eternal.” Ainhoa Aldazabal and friends of Skolastika intend to transfer the exhibition from village to village; they want to continue collecting material and removing taboos.