Tuesday 16th September
6.30-9pm
Join us to celebrate Pissing Women! Sophy Rickett will be in conversation with Darren Biabowe Barnes.
Pissing Women, visual artist and photographer Sophy Rickett’s influential series of portraits of
women pissing on the in public, caused a storm in the art world in 1994. Now, thirty years later, these era-defining images are reproduced with testimonies from the writers, musicians, artists and creatives on whose work they have had a profound influence. Featuring positioning essays from and interviews with musician St Vincent, poet Eileen Myles, artist Chila Burman, choreographer Holly Blakey, filmmaker Sophie Fiennes, actor Lily Cole, comedian Sophie Duker, photographer Juno Calypso and more, Rickett’s pioneering exploration of female identity, memory and the upheaval of the post-Thatcher years is revisited here – and remains as remarkable in the 21st century as it did three decades ago.
Sophy Rickett is an award-winning artist and writer whose work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and the Centre Pompidou, Paris. Her work is held in major public and private collections such as the UK Government Art Collection and the Federal Reserve, Washington D.C. It has also been featured in mainstream media outlets including The Observer and Libération. Her ground-breaking series Pissing Women (1995) was first published in a limited-edition monograph by Climax Books (2023). In addition to her artistic practice, she is a Reader at the University of the Arts London.
Darren Biabowe Barnes is an editor and publisher based in London. The books he has worked on have been prize shortlisted, named bestsellers, and critically acclaimed in the national press. His own writing debut, an essay in anthology My Life in Beer, was published by White Rabbit/Hachette in 2025, and he has appeared on panels at University of London, University of Chichester, Monocle Radio and elsewhere, frequently discussing art publishing and more.