Image © Rita Long, Dancers by Elisabeth Buchmeyer-Lewis © Hundred Heroines
Ever felt that life should contain something other than the daily round? Looking for something that sparks your curiosity, brings you together with other like-minded people and gives you a break from the outside world?
Enter the Joyful Women Collective!
And, by being part of the Collective, you’ll be supporting our Youth Programme working with young people across Gloucestershire.
Take inspiration from our Heroine, the legendary photographer ORLAN and her trilogy of flags. Turn protest into art, get inspired and create something uplifting and connecting in an evening of fun and creativity, and reclaim your flag!
DUE TO WEATHER CONDITIONS, THIS SESSION HAS BEEN POSTPONED TO 5 FEBRUARY
The next Joyful Women Collective workshop will be on 8 January at 6.30pm when Maggie Dutton will be helping us create our own protest flags. Maggie has a life-long love of textiles and crafting and has embraced ‘Craftivism’ as a gentler but impactful way of promoting messages around social values and the environment.
This workshop builds on Maggie’s recent project to reclaim the flag of St George from those using it to sow division and intimidate minority groups, instead turning it from a means of sewing division into one of promoting shared positivity across communities.
At the workshop Maggie will help you to design a flag and applique your desired word or short slogan. All materials will be provided but if you prefer to, you can bring your own:
- Background fabric or fabric for the colours of your flag
- Contrasting fabric for the lettering: this could be something meaningful to you
- Ideas for your design. Top tip: short and sweet is best!
Sewing machines, thread, tools and additional fabrics, will be available, along with drinks and snacks to keep the fingers fuelled!
JANUARY SESSION
📍 Hundred Heroines Museum (directions here)
📅 Thursday 8 January
🕒 18:30 – 20:30
🎟️ Members £15/Non-Members £25
Book via Eventbrite and pay on the door
Flags in the Collection
We have two flags in the Collection – an original Suffragette flag with the slogan “Vote For Women” and France-Scotland from ORLAN’s trilogy of flags, which subvert the straightforward communicative capacity of flags. Flags in art often flip allegiance into defiance. Artists borrow their instant authority and then unpick it, turning symbols of nationhood into sites of dissent and women have been central to this reworking, prompting our next workshop.
About the JWC
A monthly initiative offering a space for the curious. Meeting monthly to share stories, explore creativity and become part of something glorious, our Joyful Women get involved in co-curation, enjoy artist talks and screenings, form friendships and develop their own creative practice. All in the inspiring surroundings of the Hundred Heroines museum and gallery space.
Everyone in the Collective will be invited to curate and stage the first ever JWC exhibition in November 2026, choosing the theme, the works and the interpretation.
Taking place on the first Thursday of every month, we provide the artists, the expertise, the drink and the cake to make the evening swing. All you need to do is bring yourself!
Membership comes in at four tiers:
The Joy Tier – unsure, or only want to come along occasionally? This level gives you flexibility and no large up-front financial commitment. A one-off fee of £25 (plus Eventrbite fees) per evening applies.
The Joyful Tier – keen to secure your spot at every session and make a commitment to being a Joyful Woman? A monthly subscription of £15 (or annual payment of £180) is all it will cost you (less than a coffee a week – and won’t keep you up at night).
The Joyfulest Tier – reserved for the generous and the public spirited, this level not only buys you a subscription but subsidises a free space to those who can’t afford to buy themselves one, but who would really benefit from being a part of the Collective. An annual payment of £300 gets you and one other person annual membership, our thanks and a special feeling of Joyfulness to revel in.
Finally, our Joyful Ally option for a monthly subscription of £5 directly supports our Youth Programme.
To join, email Tonia via hello@hundredheroines.org for more information.
Previously in the JWC …
November 2025
Launch event on 6 November at 6.30 pm. After a tour and informal talk about some of the great women artists featured in our collection including Dorothy Wilding, Helen Chadwick and Hannah Höch, the Collective created Dada poetry after Elina Brotherus, inspired by her Playground series.
- Elina Brotherus, John Cage’s Words Out of Joseph Beuys’ Hat, 2017. After Tristan Tzara: Manifesto on feeble love and bitter love, 1920.
To make a dadaist poem
- Take a newspaper
- Take a pair of scissors
- Choose an article as long as you are planning to make your poem
- Cut out the article
- then cut each of the words that make up this article and put them in a bag
- Shake it gently
- Then take out the scraps one aft era other in the order in which they left the bag
- Copy conscientioulsy
- The poem will be like you
