About / Über LaD.I.Y.fest Berlin
July 20, 2008
LaD.I.Y.fest is a non-profit, volunteer run ‘Do It Yourself’ (D.I.Y.) festival of music, art, film, discussions and workshops organized and orchestrated by feminist activists, artists and musicians of various genders. It helps to showcase the skills and talents of a diverse group of groundbreaking feminist people working in the arts, community building and activism. It is a participatory festival, and most importantly, a community festival that is bound together within a worldwide network.
The history of Ladyfest traces back to the Riot Grrrl movement in the US which took place in the beginning of the 90’s. When the term ‘girl’ became more and more adopted by both the fashion and music industries, the grrrls took matters into their own hands and created the tougher and more mature ‘lady’ to create a new subversive term that they could better relate to. They formed a more fitting and independent identity to show that feminism could be cool, refractory, sexy and nasty at the same time. After the first Ladyfest 2000 in Olympia, the idea soon spread to England, Italy, The Netherlands and Germany. In 2003 three independent Ladyfests happened in Hamburg, Berlin and Leipzig.
In 2009, LaD.I.Y.fest is happening for the 7th time in Berlin. Throughout the entire event, we endeavour to take the initial ideas which inspired the original Ladyfest by - ‘empowering the presence of women in the arts’ and taking them further - outside of the binary gender system.
It is about empowerment and the political project of quashing preconceptions of what determines identities. Our goal is to redefine gender stereotypes and styles.
All genders are welcome at all events at LaD.I.Y.fest Berlin (unless otherwise stated).
As LaD.I.Y.fest Berlin is non-profit, we donate any excess cash that is received to other organizations that are non-commercial. While we like to give anything we can to those who we think deserve it and of course share our feminist standards, we are especially interested in helping those that have their focus specifically on feminist and queer politics.
So to make sure you know we didn’t waste all the money on private crew partys 
here’s a list with groups that received donations from us in 2008:
- Schwarzer Kanal
- Bildwechsel
- Thought Crime Records
- Ruby Tuesday Music Camp
- also three queer projects in Warsaw: a queer gathering, AFE and the 8th march coalition
The history of Ladyfest summarized.
*********************************************
LaD.I.Y.fest Berlin ist ein unkommerzielles ‘Do it yourself’ (D.I.Y.)-Festival, das von feministischen Aktivist_innen, Künstler_innen und Musiker_innen auf freiwilliger Basis organisiert wird.
Es bietet diversen Feminist_innen, die sich künstlerisch und politisch engagieren, einen Raum im Rahmen von Konzerten, Kunstausstellungen, Filmvorführungen, Diskussionen und Workshops ihre Fähigkeiten und Talente zu zeigen. Es ist ein Mitmach- und ein Gemeinschaftsfestival!
In Berlin greifen wir die Idee der ersten Ladyfeste, ‘die Präsenz von Frauen in der Kunst zu verstärken’, auf und versuchen sie außerhalb eines binären Geschlechtersystems weiterzuführen.
Da LaD.I.Y.fest Berlin gemeinnützig ist, spenden wir unsere Erlöse jedes Jahr unterschiedlichen Organisationen, die Geld brauchen, weil sie wie wir unkommerziell und unserer Meinung nach unterstützenswert sind. Besonders gilt dies für Projekte, die sich auf feministische und queere Politik konzentrieren, aber auch andere, solange sie unsere feministische Einstellung teilen.
