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Women celebrated at Harrison Center through art, theater

Women highlighted at Harrison Center in Indianapolis

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A century after women gained the right to vote, the Harrison Center is celebrating women’s history through theater and art. A monthlong exhibit highlighting women is opening. But even with so much progress, Harrison Center representatives said there’s a lot more room to grow.

The art exhibit opening is called “We Wait. It represents the changes for women that are yet to come. At the same time, a theater production highlighting so-called “greatriarchs” will showcase local women who are pillars in the community.

Well-behaved women rarely make history, and 100 years ago, those in the women’s suffrage movement broke a few rules and moral standards of the time to help give women the right to vote with the 19th Amendment.

“This month we’re studying the anniversary of women’s right to vote in so we have an amazing show in the main gallery,” said Harrison Center Executive Director Joanna Taft.

“We Wait” is an art exhibit on display at the Harrison Center dedicated to women who waited for the right to vote and are still waiting for things like equal pay, access to education, leadership and more.

“This is our community; these are real issues that our community faces and its conversations our community needs to have,” Taft said.

But a closer conversation involves community pillars. Four women will share stories of the powerful women who helped shape them through a theater reading called, “Rasheeda’s Freedom Day and Other Stories.”

“They know the power that they have and they were women who are my age and who are even younger to feel that power,” said director Ruthie Buescher.

In Indianapolis, the women in the play are known as the “Greatriarchs,” a spin on the word matriarch. The theater presentation includes stories from a time much different than now.

“A lot of young women, they seem more independent because they know what their parents went through,” said Terri Taylor.

Through the readings, the hope is someone latches onto the message that women are powerful even while they wait.