“Is it possible to leave everything behind? Is it possible to begin again, outside and beyond every system of living you’ve ever known, reinventing what it means (and looks like) to exist as a body and soul on the land?” These questions shaped Carmen Winant’s exploration of radical reinvention, particularly within the context of the lesbian separatist communities of the 1970s. Through this process, Winant connected with Carol Newhouse, co-founder of WomanShare, a lesbian feminist community on the West Coast of the United States. Winant’s and Newhouse’s ongoing dialogue has evolved through several collaborative projects that examine the transformative impact of feminist movements from that era, viewed through the lens of Newhouse’s photographic practice and archive. The medium became an essential tool for Newhouse, allowing her to assert and control her own representation.

For the Rencontres d’Arles, they’ve created unique new work that weaves together their stories, passions, and curiosities. Over the course of a year, they engaged in a photographic dialogue—one would shoot a roll of film, wind it up, and send it across the country, where the other would expose it once more—using the technique of double exposure to create a layered interplay between their images. Double exposure was a technique used by Newhouse and her comrades to play with the singularness of pictures, or the claim of a single–often masculine–art creator.

Through this creative collaboration, the artists reclaim feminist photographic strategies. With a fulcrum in a series of images by Newhouse from the very beginning of the community, Winant and Newhouse invite us to consider how we reinvent ourselves and our histories—both individually and collectively—through the act of self-representation and interconnection. Their visual conversation delves into intergenerational relationships and feminist political legacies while bringing the experimental photographic practices of the past into the present.

— Nina Strand

CARMEN WINANT (b. 1983, San Francisco, CA, USA) is an artist based in Columbus, OH; her work utilizes installation and collage strategies to examine feminist modes of survival and revolt. 

Select exhibitions include: Manuals for Living (2025), PATRON, Chicago, IL; Carmen Winant: My Mother and Eye (2025), Public Art Fund, various cities; The Last Safe Abortion (2025), Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, Omaha, NE; Makeshift Memorial, Small Revolutions (2024), KADIST, San Francisco, CA; A Brand New End: Survival and It’s Pictures (2024), Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN; Whitney Biennial: Even Better than the Real Thing (2024), The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; Acts of Creation: On Art and Motherhood (2024), Midlands Art Centre, Arnolfini, UK ; The Mask of Prosperity (2024), Gallery 400, Chicago, IL; Her Voice – Echoes of Chantal Akerman (2023), FOMU, Antwerp; The last safe abortion (2023), Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN; Open Books (2023), Photo Elysse, Lausanne, Switzerland; The Neighbor, The Friend, The Lover (2023), Dayton Contemporary, Dayton, OH; A Brand New End: Survival and Its Pictures (2022), The Print Center, New York, NY; Working Thought (2022), Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA; The Neighbor, The Friend, The Lover (2022), Gävle konstcentrum, Gävle, Sweden; Picturing Motherhood Now (2021), Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH; Maternar (2021), Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Ciudad de México, México; The Making and Unmaking of the World (2021), PATRON, Chicago, IL; My Birth (2018), Museum of Modern Art, Manhattan, NY; New Visions (2020), The Henie Onstad Triennial for Photography and New Media, Oslo, NO; Another Echo (2018), Sculpture Center, Queens, NY; Gray Matters (2017), Wexner Art Center, Columbus, OH; WITCHHUNT (2020), Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen, DN; XYZ-SOB-ABC (2019), CONTACT Photography festival,Toronto, CN. 

She has been commissioned by The Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburg, PA, The ICA Boston, Boston, MA, and The Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City, Mexico. Recently published artist books: My Birth and Notes on Fundamental Joy, by SPBH Editions, ITI press, and Printed Matter Inc. 

Respectively, her work is included in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; The Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN; Photo Elysse, Lausanne, Switzerland; The Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; The Henie Onstad Art Center, Høvikodden, Norway. Recent awards include: Guggenheim Fellow in photography (2019), The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage Grantee (2020) , 2020 FCA Grant recipient in Art (2020) , American Academy of Arts and Letters honoree (2021).