The Eva-Lisa stipend
This year the Eva-Lisa stipend is handed out for the second time. Eva-Lisa Bengtson (1932-2018) was a Swedish trans trailblazer and lesbian feminist. In 1964 she started the first club for trans people in Sweden and in the end of the 1970s she was part of starting the Women's house on Snickarbacken in Stockholm. She was also a driving force in several other organisations focusing on rights for trans people, women and lesbians. The stipend amounts to 10 000 SEK, is tax-free and is given to a person or group who works in the spirit of Eva-Lisa.
More info on how to nominate a candidate for the stipend can be found here >>Eva-Lisas Monument: Berättelsen om en transpionjär (2025)
In 2026 the artist Sam Hultin meets Eva-Lisa Bengtson - a trailblazer in the Swedish trans movement, a lesbian feminist and one of the founders of the Women’s House in Stockholm. It turns out that she has a treasure at home, a personal archive over her life as an activist and a story only a few have ever heard of. In their book about Eva-Lisa Hultin both portrays a profound personal story as well as a transforming society. We follow the battles, but are also invited into parties in smoke filled basements and dance studios, dramatic protests with Lesbisk Front and to the everyday life of the organisations characterized by community and solidarity. The story about Eva-Lisa makes us discover those who have always been there. In small discrete venues. In suburban townhouses with neatly ironed curtains. At a desk at in a bureaucratic office somewhere in Sweden. A hidden history is finally brought into light.
The book is in Swedish. An English excerpt, translated by Jane Davis, can be read here >>