By Lindsay Shimizu, Volunteer

By reading the stories of the past and observing the people who visited the exhibition, my time working as a steward at Bristol Women’s Voice’s International Women’s Day event allowed me to thoroughly appreciate how far my Bristol community has come and where it’s going.

On each side of Bristol’s City Hall building is a small, echo-y room called a vestibule. Every year that Bristol Women’s Voice puts on its International Women’s Day event, these vestibules hold two art exhibitions which are open all day and free to anyone attending the event. This year the Park Street vestibule held Uncovering Bristol’s Hidden Activists, celebrating the lives and achievements of women in Bristol whose stories have often gone untold. As my shift at the exhibition went on, I recognised just how important the placement of this exhibition was. The vestibules were a perfect setting to showcase past activists, current artists, and a present community eager to learn about the history of women in Bristol.

Hidden Activists hung illustrations of historic Bristol women, accompanied by the stories detailing what made these activists’ contributions so significant. Women dating as far back as the 1700s to the present day were brought to the fore by local artists. At my spot in the vestibule, I found myself struck both by the women illustrated on the walls and everyone who stopped to read their story. All day I watched visitors pass by the exhibition. Some stopped in immediately to mill the room and learn. Many passed the room to get to the panels and workshops inside. But though the exhibition was not everyone’s first stop, many of those same patrons who passed it on their way to the main hall made it a point to stop inside before they left College Green for the day. In this way, the very location of the vestibules allowed Hidden Activists to be remembered and rediscovered throughout the entire celebration. 

The vestibules of Bristol were once the entrances to the building. How fitting, I think, to place these women’s stories in a room with that forgotten history. In both its subjects and setting Hidden Activists captured a theme of rediscovery, but this exhibition did more than return to the past. As I reflect now on my remembrance for these women, I can’t help but think of the liveliness of the event, of my fellow volunteers, and of the members of the community. This exhibition was not merely a history lesson. Uncovering Bristol’s Hidden Activists succeeded, not because it unlocked the past, but because it connected the past to the present and encouraged us not to let future contributions go unnoticed.