GWS: A month or so ago you and Suzanne Lacy told me that you simply "wanted to stop violence against women." It's a basic statement, reinforced by the strength and conviction from your life and work. Now, it's been over a thirty-year mission for you. Tell us how it all began.

LL: Over the years I have asked myself the question about where this passion behind my commitment to women and violence against women in particular comes from.  It started with my mother, a Holocaust survivor. I was born almost 10 months after she was released from Auschwitz at the end of the war.  In the many years I have had to reflect on the direction my life has taken, I recognize that I have always had an unconscious drive to right the wrongs in the world for the injustices perpetrated against the Jews in general and my mother in particular. I see this personal challenge as the major impetus drawing me to the public and to the activist tactics of the performance art, especially on violence against women that Suzanne and I developed in the late 70's.

Another motivating factor that affected the direction of my artwork was living in Germany and Spain and then my return to the US in 1977.  In the 5 years I lived abroad, I felt safe to move freely in the streets day and night. The contrast between my physical freedom in Europe and the fear I felt moving around LA helped me clarify the issues that I saw as the most urgent.  It was evident to me that if I was to make a difference in the lives of women, one had to start with stopping the victimization of women in the streets as well as at home.  Suzanne and I aimed high and I believe we made a difference.

GWS: Tell me about when you met Suzanne. Was it an instant connection?

LL: I met Suzanne for the first time at a College Art Association conference in 1977 in Los Angeles. She performed "the old lady piece" there and I thought she was amazing. Just returned from Germany, I was looking to connect to other politically oriented feminist artists and was referred to Suzanne. I introduced myself to her and she immediately recruited me to work on Three Weeks In May. We came together at a time when both of our art strategies were in alignment so it was an instant connection that has not changed over the years.

GWS: Where do you feel yourself situated in the history of feminism?

LL: I guess I would be considered from the 2^nd Wave. I came to my feminism as an artist and it was through my role as an artist and the artwork that followed that I evolved as a woman, wife, and mother.  I would not be the strong person I have become if it weren't for the feminist movement. It changed my life completely. I started out as a conceptual artist with only male role models. My work was empty of anything personal or feminine and I didn't see any other options possible until I first heard the inklings of the Feminist Art Program at Cal Arts and Judy Chicago. Even though I didn't take part in that program as I was in the masters program at Otis , it still affected my awareness. I performed Menstruation-Wait in 1971 at Otis as my first feminist statement.

GWS: How did your vested relationship to feminism affect your daughter? What is she like?

LL: My daughter is an incredible young woman of 24 who takes many of the changes the feminists of my time fought for granted. At the same time I think she is aware there is a sexual politics that underlies the social fabric of our culture that she will have to deal with as she joins the work world.  She has just received her Masters from the London School of Economics in Social and Organizational Psychology.  She hopes to be working with organizations and businesses doing training and coaching.  I know that she sees me as a role model and is closely connected to her godmothers; both artists, one of which is Suzanne. She's been mentored by Jackie Apple, another artist and other women professionals. Unlike my generation she is not trying to disconnect from the female role models around her. She is supported by a circle of women both young and old.

GWS: One of your artworks turned into a business. Now in addition to roles of mother, feminist, and artist you are also a successful business-woman. How did that transition come about?

LL: As I mentioned earlier, after the "anti-violence" series I switched gears and found myself searching for a more personal exploration of my relationship to violence. I was also looking for a way to make a living as an artist. I was always interested in health food as it was called at that time so it was a natural evolution that I would start growing "sprouts" in my garage in Venice in 1980 and sell them to the few health food stores around like Cooportunity and Mrs. Gooch's.  The metaphor of the sprout growing process which goes through the life cycle of  birth, life and death within 3 days seemed the perfect vehicle to explore my personal issues, the socio-politics of  agriculture, food distribution and economics of the artist.

The performance/installations known as "Sproutime" took places in galleries in San Francisco and New York City and my backyard in Venice. They were centered around sprout gardens I created at the sites. At a certain point I realized that to run a successful business I had to give it my 100% and I made the choice to do that for the last 18 years. In that time I expanded the business and now own 3/4 of an acre of agricultural land with 25,000 sq. ft. of greenhouses where organic greens and sprouts are grown and I run a natural foods manufacturing plant with 50 employees named "Foodology." As an art/life artist I put my creative drive into building an organization and business that fulfills my social mission and economic needs.

GWS:  How did being a feminist make you better equipped to be a better business-woman?

LL: There is no doubt that being a feminist and an artist made me better equipped to handle starting and running a business.  Because I was an artist, money was not my only motivation, which is necessary in the beginning stages of any business. It was the passion for the creation of an urban agricultural farm, the health potential of the food and the beauty of the growing process that drove me to figure out how to grow it, sell it and market it. As a feminist I wanted to control my destiny and not work for anyone but myself. I wanted to create a work environment for people that was humane; not sexist or racist and still make a profit.  "Sproutime" was a pure idealistic endeavor at the outset. "Foodology" is a mature business at this point.

Leslie Labowitz explains the archive to Primitivo Suarez.
Photographs taken by Ginger Wolfe-Suarez.