By Annie Johnston (Daughter-in-Law of Monica Sjöö)

She’s one of the most important feminist artists of our time and her work remains just as relevant and powerful today. She has been an inspiration to millions of women across the world and it’s time for her to be introduced to a new audience of women. Have you missed her up to now?

So exactly who was Monica? She can be described as a visionary eco- feminist artist, writer and life-long radical anarcho activist who was instrumental in the formation of the Goddess movement. Sounds a mouthful eh? But she really was all those things and more.

Born in Sweden in 1938, by the late 1950’s she had begun tackling sexism and racism in her work. Always willing to stand up against injustice and oppression she spent the rest of her life engaged in the politics of feminist change. Her mantra was no spirituality without politics. Those politics always included action. She lived her politics and in that sense you could say that her art was activism and her activism included her art.

Very socially and politically aware from a young age, she joined many of the left-wing groups around her in Sweden in the 60s. She was angry and keen to be part of the change that she saw as necessary. Working within the Anti-Vietnam War Movement led by Maoists, she found role models in the powerful women who were part of the leadership. It wasn’t the same in some of the Anarchist groups, she found herself asking the men ‘what are you doing that relates to women and their lives? Where are the women in this group and what are they doing?  The replies showed her that there was little understanding of the basic mechanics of oppression or the will to address it. She became disillusioned with these male-dominated groups and sought out women’s groups.

For a few years, she was back and forth between Sweden and England, she spent four years in Wales eventually settling in Bristol. 

It was the natural home birth of her second son that changed her life and the way she painted. She said ‘I found that birth so extraordinary and very much a spiritual/physical almost religious experience. I could find NO split between the mind/body that we are supposed to believe in – and I couldn’t understand that we women can be called ‘weak’ when our beings are capable of such strength as creation through birth’. As a result she painted the now iconic ‘God Giving Birth’ depicting a black woman giving birth to the universe. It’s an extremely powerful image and clearly frightened some who saw it because it was removed from two exhibitions in Swiss Cottage Library and St Ives, after complaints were made. She was threatened with prosecution for blasphemy and obscenity. This, in a society where women everywhere could see degrading and obscene images of themselves in the press and on the shelves of newsagents, with often an outright sadistic exploitative attitude towards women’s sexuality. Monica felt that a witch hunt had been launched against her. She wrote an open letter calling for other women artists to meet. Out of this meeting a feminist arts manifesto was born called ‘Towards a Revolutionary Feminist Art’. She saw that art could certainly be a revolutionary act.

However, the birth of her son had been such a powerful transformative experience that she said she could never betray it. She determined to paint figuratively about her own woman’s experiences. Deciding that she would only exhibit with women. She had been traumatised by the threats of prosecution and needed the support of other women artists.

 It quickly became obvious, when she subsequently exhibited images of birth and women’s experiences, that it was not considered a suitable subject matter for art by the mainstream and alternative art world. Her work was censured many times in the 70s and 80s, receiving lots of negative comments, she was told her work was ugly and obscene which puzzled her. Are our real experiences of our own bodies not to be shared?

Discovering Robert Graves’s ‘The White Goddess’ changed her outlook. She read everything she could find on matriarchy and women’s culture. The only images she found were from very ancient Greece and she started to explore in her paintings the strong vibes she was getting from these images. What was it that was being conveyed? She said ‘I felt this very strong, mystic thing of being used as a medium for some kind of feminine power’.

Monica was a co-founder of the Bristol Women’s Liberation Movement, campaigning in the Abortion Campaign, Claimants Union, and Wages for Housework groups over many years. She actively demonstrated and marched making the banners that she carried using her own art. She took part in the Greenham Women’s Peace Camp actions, at Long Ashton Research Centre where research was going on into genetically engineered crops and was involved in an action at Bristol Cathedral. Monica and 15 other women stormed in and interrupted a mass. She was holding a banner she had made with the image of God Giving Birth. They held their own ceremony singing all the verses from ‘The Burning Times’ –  a song about the witch hunts and the genocide/gendercide of mainly women. Her active political/spiritual life was never more in focus than then. She remembered feeling that they had made an opening in Women’s collective consciousness and how important that felt.

After being in the women’s movement she was never willing to work in a mixed group or the straight left. In 1975 she was asked how she saw the future of the women’s movement and whether it was progressing. Her answer was ‘I don’t know. All I know is that we are the future, we are the only people with anything of relevance to say. Women have to rise, or that’s the end of everything’.

Monica published four books in her lifetime ‘The Great Cosmic Mother: Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth’ co-written with the poet Barbara Mor. It was the result of her tireless research into ancient matriarchal cultures and the end result of ten years of work. She had an incredibly clear mind that could focus, retain and draw connections together. Somewhat of a genius.

‘New Age and Armageddon: The Goddess or the Gurus a Feminist Vision of the Future’ and it’s re-write ‘Return of the Dark/Light Mother or New Age Armageddon’  was written questioning the new age movement after her eldest son’s awful experiences with the rebirthing movement. It is an exposé of the dangers of a New Age consciousness that denies the economic and political realities of our lives whilst revering the ‘light’ and sky ‘fathers/gods’. ‘The Nordic Goddess’ was her last book telling the story of the re-discovery of the ancient Norse Goddess a return to the myths and legends of her childhood.

Monica was a prolific contributor to women’s, pagan, Spiritual, and Goddess journals, writing articles on all kinds of topics She was also a diligent letter writer to both friends and journals and kept up this correspondence her entire life. In the days before the internet existed she was an incredible net-worker and connector of people. Quite a feat at that time.

 One of her passions was making pilgrimages to sacred sites all over the world, where she sketched and drew inspiration, later translating them into much larger paintings. Her paintings are large, bold and colourful with symbols and images that move and intrigue you. She toured internationally, gave slide shows and talks as part of her artistic practice, always wanting to make sure the politics were never lost. As she said ‘sometimes an image isn’t enough and you have to spell it out’.

Monica died in 2005 but her legacy lives on. Her work and words are as important today as at any time during her life.

One of her paintings is called ‘Sibyl Looks Into the Future and Finds it Wanting’

Here in 2022 that future still is wanting!

We will be at the FiLiA 2022 conference giving a talk and slide show in the style of Monica herself. Come along meet us and find out more about this remarkable woman.

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 Images ©Monica Sjöö Estate