Museum’s women-only ‘Ladies Lounge’ exhibit ordered to admit men

Kirsha Kaechele (in front), creator of the Ladies Lounge, leaves the court hearing in the Tasmania – Charlotte Vignau/Mona

A museum’s women-only space featuring a Picasso has been ordered to admit men after a legal challenge.

The Ladies Lounge, billed as a living artwork within the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) in Hobart, Tasmania, was intended to upend notions of misogyny and male patriarchy.

It took the concept of an old-fashioned Australian pub – a blokey, chauvinistic environment from which women were largely excluded until the 1960s – and turned it on its head, reversing themes of entitlement and sexism. Women were ushered in and served champagne by subservient male waiters – the only men allowed in the space.

Adorned with green silk drapes, elegant divans, subdued lighting and paintings by Picasso and Sidney Nolan, the Australian artist, it has been open since 2020.

But the ladies-only restriction was challenged by a male visitor to the museum, who complained that it was discriminatory.

Jason Lau, from New South Wales, visited the museum in April last year and objected to being told he could not go into the Ladies Lounge.

A court in Tasmania ruled in his favour on Tuesday, ordering the museum to open up the attraction to men.

Women were ushered in to the Ladies Lounge exhibit and served champagne by subservient male waiters – the only men allowed in the space – ABC News/Luke Bowden

Mr Lau argued that the museum had violated Tasmania’s anti-discrimination laws by failing to provide “a fair provision of goods and services in line with the law” to him and other men.

The museum had argued that the sense of exclusion and discrimination was key to the whole idea of the installation and was therefore legitimate.

That was rejected by the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, with judge Richard Grueber ordering the museum to start admitting men within the next 28 days.

The museum’s supporters may now try to take the case to Tasmania’s Supreme Court.

“Mr Lau is male. As he does not identify as a lady, he was refused entry to the Ladies Lounge. He had paid the full entry price for Mona but was not able to experience the artwork contained within the Ladies Lounge. The refusal to permit Mr Lau entry to the Ladies Lounge was direct discrimination,” Mr Grueber said in his ruling.

He characterised the case as a “conflict between an artwork which deliberately and overtly discriminates for artistic purpose and legislation which has the objective of prohibiting discrimination”.

“From Caravaggio to Jeff Koons, artists and their art have at times had a difficult relationship with the law. This is not surprising,” Mr Grueber said.

He said that while the Ladies Lounge had been established with a “good faith artistic purpose”, it still ran counter to discrimination laws.

A representative for the museum said: “We are deeply disappointed by this decision.”

‘Phallus-shaped velvet couch’

The Ladies Lounge was created by Kirsha Kaechele, an artist and curator, who in a statement to the court described its central feature as a phallus-shaped velvet couch, or as she put it, “a tethered, rearing, restrained-by-golden-chains-and-then-ultimately-defeated phallus”.

The space also features Venetian chandeliers, a marble table and ceremonial spears from the South Pacific.

The Lounge was intended as a foil to “this strange and disjointed world of male domination”, Ms Kaechele said. It was a riposte to the “lived experience of women forbidden from entering certain spaces throughout history”.

About 20 women who attended the hearings in support of the museum were criticised by the judge for engaging in synchronised movements and apparently using the courtroom as a platform for performance art.

When they left the tribunal building, dressed in blue suits, they put on co-ordinated dance moves to the strains of Simply Irresistible by Robert Palmer.

Mr Grueber said that although the women had not disrupted the proceedings, their conduct had been “inappropriate, discourteous and disrespectful, and at worst contumelious and contemptuous”.

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