by Kathlene McGovern
It’s an election year. That special time in America when candidates latch on to issues of freedom: personal, financial, lifestyle. Who has too many of them, who doesn’t have enough and the notso-subtle suggestion that if you don’t vote for them, you will surely lose some that are most precious to you. But when I recently took in an exhibition at Skirball Cultural Center, a museum/gallery/performing arts center here in Los Angelescalled Women Hold Up Half the Sky, the personal freedoms we already possess in our nation took on a whole new meaning.
Inspired by the book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, by Pulitzer prize-winning journalists Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, Women Hold Up Half the Sky features interactive exhibits including documentary photographs, visual art, sound installations and gallery experiences that are designed to shine a light on the persistence of atrocities committed against women around the world including sex trafficking, gender-based violence and maternal mortality: good times right? Actually, yes. These installations also tell tales of resilience, ingenuity, entrepreneurship and eventual freedom.
Skirball Museum Director Robert Kirschner, who conceived the exhibit, considers the show an expression of the center’s commitment to human rights and its belief in the power of grassroots action. “It is a unique hybrid of gallery installation and community 
engagement project affording visitors multiple opportunities to learn, give, share, advocate, and connect.”
There is no such thing as a little freedom. Either you are all free, or you are not. –Walter Cronkite
The only place that kind of freedom can happen is in the mind and the spirit. These women, under the most deplorable of conditions, have not only survived but thrived and are, even now, leaving a legacy of education and empowerment for their daughters—and sons, because the future of change lies in creating new paradigms of thought and belief for both the sexes.
Celebrating the women’s roles in workable solutions to their situations, the Skirball considers Women Hold Up Half the Sky to be “an uplifting call to action” and provides opportunities to participate in the grassroots movements Kirschner desires to champion. Visitors will find postcards to Congress regarding pertinent legislation, to be mailed by the Skirball on their behalf, computer stations that provide access to www.halftheskymovement.org, which identifies more opportunities and resources to aid women and, through their partnership with JoinFITE.org, the museum provides the chance to give a microloan to women entrepreneurs in developing nations throughout the exhibit’s visitor-action areas.
Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you. –Jean-Paul Sartre
From the mouths of existential authors to the ears of…us. The one resounding note throughout this exhibit was the gratitude of these women. Gratitude for micro-loans of $2 to plant potatoes…for being rescued from brothels…for being able to feed and educate their children…for having one more day to breathe the sweet air of life. And proving that 
when we reach out to empower one, we’re really reaching ahead to empower us all.
The Wish Canopy, conceived and created by Lisa Little and Emily White, principals of the L.A. architecture office Layer, is an interactive art installation that allows visitors to walk beneath a sculptural armature which contains the handwritten wishes of gallery visitors in response to the prompt “share a wish for a woman or girl you know” or “share a wish for a woman facing a difficult situation.” Designed as a visual testament to the power of collective action, the work continues to evolve as visitors “hold up the sky” with their wishes making this one of the most powerful works in the exhibition.
I wish that every human life might be pure, transparent freedom. –Simone de Beauvoir
Women Hold Up Half the Sky tells stories of women challenged by abuse, illness, poverty and enslavement and their rebirth to a life of pure, transparent freedom
Women Hold Up Half the Sky runs until March 11, 2012 at The Skirball Cultural Center 2701 N. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90049.
Museum hours: Tuesday–Friday 12:00–5:00 p.m.; Saturday–Sunday 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.; closed Mondays and holidays, including November 24, December 25, and January 1.
Admission to exhibitions: $10 General; $7 Seniors, Full-Time Students, and Children over 12; $5 Children 2–12. Exhibitions are always free to Skirball Members and Children under 2. Exhibitions are free to all visitors on Thursdays. For general information, the public may call (310) 440-4500
For more information on Women Hold Up Half the Sky and related programs visit www.skirball.org.
