Girlstotee may be the first women’s golf photography exhibition in the world - certainly the first we know of. We spoke to founder Isabelle Östlund about how the exhibition came about, why female players and photographers are so underrepresented in the game, and what a female view on golf might look like.
Hi Isabelle! Do you want to tell us a little bit about yourself?
My name is Isabel Östlund - I’m from Sweden, but moved to Berlin about 10 years ago after falling in love with the city on my interrail travels. After a year or so there, I learned the language and started my photography studies at Lette Verein, which I graduated from in 2021. I’ve since been working at a retouch agency, editing high-end commercial and fashion imagery.
As much as I love doing that, I kind of miss being outside and not just spending eight hours a day in front of Photoshop. So in January, in the beautiful Berlin winter (I was probably the only one in my company who was enjoying it, everyone else is from a hotter country), I decided I wanted to start something outside of work. Around that time, I was on a project where we retouched images of golfers from the LPGA and PGA Tours. Coming from a family of golfers and having played it when I was young, I realised that I was really missing it.
So golf is something that’s always been close to you?
Definitely, but I stopped playing because of the lack of women playing the game. When I started, I had some girls to play with, but they literally dropped out one after another. I tried inviting other friends to play, but it didn’t stick with them. In the end, there was only my mum left to play with - so I stopped playing altogether (laughs).
Understandable! How did girlstotee come about?
I realised I wanted to combine my backgrounds in photography and golf and create an exhibition to motivate girls and women to play. There is a lot of really cool photography of men playing the game, but just not much of women. I wanted to change that, because I think photography is a great tool to inspire. A lot of the time you see something and think ‘this is cool, I can see myself doing this.’ That’s also why the exhibition focuses on photography of women in golf - also by male photographers, although we obviously do have a lot of female photographers on board. It's more about what's on the image and not who took it.
I started with an open call for photos and wrote a long text about what I was looking for, shared images to do with golf on my personal instagram and reached out to people. Sometimes when I found something that I thought was really cool, I wrote to the photographer and asked if they wanted to be part of this. Most people who received the message responded really positively. In the end, the mixture of pictures that got chosen came from photographers that I wrote directly to and from the open call. People reacted really positively overall and were happy to share it. Even the Swedish Golf Federation shared it and were really positive about it from the beginning, so that was a big support.
For the selection and curation, I brought in Julia Fechner, who I studied with at Lette Verein. It didn't feel right to choose the images alone, so it was great to have someone to give some input and see other things. She is part of a contemporary photography gallery where she curates exhibitions as well as exhibiting her own work. Julia also doesn’t have a background in golf, which I think was actually a really good thing to bring a fresh perspective!
So yeah, we got everything printed and framed locally last week and installed the show on Tuesday. I was a bit nervous to see if everything fits, because I’d only sketched up the install with the help of Photoshop and ChatGPT from Berlin. And my dad helped me out with measuring the space and sending me photos!
How come you settled on Kårsta Golfklubb as the venue?
It’s actually the course I grew up playing - it’s a beautiful place, exactly how you would imagine an idyllic Swedish golf course. There are red houses with white corners everywhere and wild strawberries growing on the sides of the fairways. When my brother became a manager a year ago, it opened up new possibilities - I knew I could do something there now. Then in March I pitched him the idea of doing an exhibition, and he was all for it. The club wants to get more women to play, so it aligned perfectly with their vision!
How did the event go and how was it for you?
Yeah, it went well! People were a bit hesitant to go in at first, because, well, it’s a golf course and people are there to golf. At some point I walked around on the golf course and was like, ‘Hey, come in and check it out, don't be afraid, it's not a private event,’ because I know that we Swedes naturally are a bit hesitant. A lot of the mindset is that if something is happening there, it probably doesn't have anything to do with them, and then they rather avoid it than actually go and check it out. So people did have to be pushed a little bit. We had some drinks there, and the restaurant had made these really nice cakes with strawberries and flowers on top, so it looked very neat.
I think us Germans may be similar in that regard (laughs). I’m sure they were stunned when they saw the exhibition?
Definitely, it was really nice to see their positive responses. They were really excited and surprised, and there was great feedback overall. The exhibition is open for 3 more weeks, so I also expect that I’ll hear a lot more about it. For the last week of the show, everyone will be on summer vacation and there are open competitions, so there should be lots more people coming and giving feedback.
You mentioned there are not many women playing, and I would argue that their representation in the golf industry is even less. Why do you think women are so underrepresented in golf photography, for example?
Golf is a very male-dominated area, and I think there's always this tendency where men naturally take more space, while women are holding back more. Speaking for myself, sometimes you come into a situation where you maybe don't take the space, while a man would not care so much about what other people think, and then they just go and not overthink it so much. Also I hear a lot from people working in the photography industry that when you work your way up a little bit higher, you meet more not-so-nice people, and maybe women have more difficulty continuing past that.
Some people have an ingrained mindset that women are not as good at stuff, or they would rather work with a man because they're less complicated, even though that's not true. Just hearing somebody say this means you already have quite a hurdle to step over. You need to prove yourself all the time. You need to constantly remind yourself that you can do it, because somebody already from the beginning thinks that you can't.
How do you think we can change that?
I think the important thing is to show that there is representation. There are women. There are different ways of doing things. And it's not only this American instagram-style golf woman. You don't have to wear a short skirt. You can go in another direction. That's also a little bit what I felt I wanted to do with this exhibition. There's another way where I feel I can identify myself with more. Doing this project has been great to see that there are many groups specifically supporting women projects or women photographers in golf, and to see how supportive they were of this idea.
Would you say there is a male gaze dominant in golf photography? Is there a female eye on golf, and if so what is it?
Maybe that's what I'm looking for, actually. Golf photography is so much about this male gaze, with all the imagery that’s floating around. I'm kind of missing this female gaze and want to ask, ‘what is it that we actually see?’ That's what drives me really, trying to find and explore that female eye on golf. I couldn't say right now exactly what that is - but I hope that girlstotee helps identify it!
Talking about photos, can you share more about one or two images from the exhibition that really intrigue you?
They all have something that works really well for them, but I really like the one by Michael Dunn from his Bolivia series. In the image, Martha and Teresa are standing in front of the ‘Moon Hole’, the most iconic hole at La Paz Golf Club, sitting at 3400 Metres above sea level. His work popped up when I was reaching out, and I immediately realised that that was exactly what I was looking for. You can see a deep knowledge of photography in his images and what makes it an art form. Thinking about positioning, composition - everything is there for a reason and you can read so much into it. And I think it's also an image that, even if you know nothing about photography, you see it and it makes an impact. It was kind of difficult to choose between his images, but we eventually settled with the one where they are standing in front of the mural.
It’s the same with all of the images really, but I also liked Adela Pérez Galán's image with the girl lying on the grass with the golf balls. It was also part of a series and she was one of the ones who sent work through the open call - it was so fun to read about it and her portrait project. Again, there's so much information in the image, which I really like!
Fantastic, thank you so much. What are some future ideas and plans for girlstotee?
We definitely want to have some smaller pop-up versions of girlstotee in other places, and then maybe have one big exhibition every year. I have also had people reach out who want to collaborate in some way with the idea, which is really nice. I just have to think about how to do it, because I find it’s a fine line when you collaborate with a brand. You don't want it to become advertisement. It needs to benefit both sides. I don't want the photographers to feel like they're getting used for a brand’s representation. So I’ll need to find out how to do that.
Of course it comes down to money in the end. This time we got support from my hometown. They put out a call for people doing cultural projects to apply for funding. We did, and they accepted it, so it all got covered. To continue doing it, there needs to be somewhere we can get money for the printing and poster making, and so on.
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Girlstotee at Kårsta Golfklubb is on until the 14th of July. For requests for prints, reach out to Isabelle and the photographers directly. And don't forget to follow Isabelle, Julia and Girlstotee on Instagram.