Protest and Reclaiming

This chapter explores revolutionary aesthetics and the role of online engagement for the twenty-first-century incarnation of the 1970s radical feminist group W.I.T.C.H. The politics of both groups are radical for their times, although they differ dramatically in terms of representation and focus. The modern W.I.T.C.H. can be seen as an act of socially engaged art, using tropes of the monstrous to challenge patriarchal power.

This chapter is a messy feminist archive of a series of absurd acts. Since 2016, a group of loosely affiliated feminists has constructed a series of performative protests, from witch-ins to a vulva detox tent. The group uses the absurdity of its acts to say something about the impossibility of the moment. The authors show how these acts are part of a long tradition of feminist activism that has utilized the figure of the witch, at times ironically, at times sincerely. The authors excavate how affective protests like witch-ins can, in fact, create catharsis, and how catharsis can create the emotional space for feminist work to continue despite the dangers.