In her installation so the roots be known, Sarah Zapata centers Kansas City lesbian and feminist histories that she learned about while conducting research at the Gay and Lesbian Archive of Mid-America (GLAMA) at the University of Missouri–Kansas City (UMKC). In part, this installation pays homage to Womontown, a group of primarily queer women who established a revolutionary community in the Longfellow (Dutch Hill) neighborhood of Kansas City in the late 1980s. It also references the national lesbian magazine The Ladder (1956–1970), founded by the Daughters of Bilitis and later operated remotely by recognized writer and publisher Barbara Grier in Kansas City.

On Wednesday, April 24 this panel at Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, explores the importance and power of archives featuring Stuart Hinds, curator of special collections & archives at UMKC Libraries, Sue Moreno, Womontown resident and contributor to GLAMA, and Jeanne Vaccaro, scholar and curator at the University of Kansas, moderated by Yashi Davalos, curatorial fellow at Charlotte Street Foundation.

Image: Detail of Sarah Zapata: So the roots be known, August 18, 2023–July 28, 2024, Atrium, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri. Photo: E.G. Schempf, 2023.