¬ Lyónn Wolf

Part of Lyónn Wolf’s "Domestic Optimism" series, their new sound piece "A Lesbian Squat Isn’t Just for Pornos" reimagines Ballymun’s high-rise towers in Dublin—once a vibrant working-class community until its demolition in the 1990s—as sites of queer-transfeminist, working-class resilience. Set in a speculative present, "A Lesbian Squat Isn't Just for Pornos" brings listeners to The Lazerbeam Theirstory Projects (LTP), a hybrid space located in Radclyffe Hall—the last standing high-rise tower in Ballymun. Saved from demolition and reclaimed by LGBTQI+ activists, this utopian squat houses a library, DIY publishing tools, meeting spaces, and historical artefacts.

Wolf enlists performers Pêdra Costa, Transboy Dom, and Line Skywalker Karlström to give voice to a conversation, which (re-)animates lost and imaginary narratives of queer solidarity, resistance, and community. The four conversation partners—the nameless Queer Housing Historian (Lyónn Wolf), Kazzy (Line Skywalker Karlström) and Anto (Transboy Dom), both co-founders of the Radclyffe Hall squat tower, and Shaz (Pêdra Costa), the founder of a publishing house located in the squat—draw on the history of Ballymun's architecture and the power of collective living in defiance of capitalist erasure and urban redevelopment. Here, at LTP, voices echo through armchairs designed by modernist Eileen Gray, reclaimed by the squatters from the almost-closed Museum of Decorative Arts and History. The tower, now surrounded by gardens and community-maintained spaces, stands in stark contrast to the flimsy new developments around it. Through speculative storytelling, polyphony and scenic reading "A Lesbian Squat Isn't Just for Pornos" constructs a sonic space where forgotten (hi)stories of activism, solidarity, and resilience come alive in a real-life-like utopia. The work challenges the erasure of both queer and working-class identities and reclaims spaces of joy, optimism, and resistance, envisioning a future where both those heritages are interconnected, celebrated, and sustained.

"A Lesbian Squat Isn't Just for Pornos", co-produced by GOSSIP GOSSIP GOSSIP and Scriptings, is based on the text Radclyffe Hall—The Lazerbeam Theirstory Projects from the publication Text in Public—Zine Performances and Rants (2022), the first monograph of writing by visual artist Lyónn Wolf (formerly Emma Wolf-Haugh). The book, which interconnects performative works, performance scripts, and assemblage texts, traverses particular cultural and historical sites, the lived present and imagined futures, incorporating auto-fiction and anecdote as part of a tradition of queer-transfeminist working class vernacular and ethics. Text in Public—Zine Performances and Rants is part of the reader format Scriptings: Political Scenarios, edited by artist Achim Lengerer and published by Scriptings with additional distribution by Archive Books (print) and Eeclectic (digital).

"A Lesbian Squat Isn't Just for Pornos" was commissioned for the exhibition „Domestic Optimism III – A Lesbian Squat Isn't Just for Pornos“, which is part of Zeitgeist Irland 24, an initiative of Culture Ireland and the Embassy of Ireland in Germany.
With the additional kind support of theaterhaus berlin.

Bild: Victoria Tomaschko

A Lesbian Squat Isn’t Just for Pornos

Hörspiel, 2024
mit Pêdra Costa, Transboy Dom, und Line Skywalker Karlsström