Celebrating Women's History Month in East London

On Beauty exhibition: Photographic portraits of staff and students at Cass Faculty of Art. Photograph: Sue Andrews

Not to be outdone by International Women’s Day, women artists, writers, performers and community groups in Tower Hamlets are putting on a range of events and exhibitions to celebrate Women’s History Month.

Talks, art exhibitions, performances, films and comedy will be taking place throughout the month. At East London Idea Stores, the history of women in war will be the focus of a series of events. Photographer Jenny Matthews will be showing her work on the effects of war on women from across the world, there will be a talk on the suffragettes, as well as a screening about British nurse Edith Cavell.

Other free film screenings include Going Through the Change!, the London premiere of a film made for the National Women Against Pit Closures at the Bishopsgate Institute. There’s also Looking for Light: Jane Bown, a moving portrait of the photographer Jane Bown, at the Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design, as well as an archive screening of Granny’s Girls, a 1960s documentary about the lives of women from a close-knit Bethnal Green family, showing at Tower Hamlets Local History Library.

Art exhibitions to mark Women’s History Month include the Museum of Water by Amy Sharrocks at Chisenhale Dance Space and MMMother at the Darnley Gallery, and over at Rich Mix there’s a full programme of performance featuring a Kathak interpretation of Federico García Lorca’s play Yerma, and contemporary dance from the Hagit Yaker Dance Company.

See alternativearts.co.uk for more details