Sarah Ackland: Taking Space

Architect and researcher, Sarah Ackland, presents a micro exhibition of a series of creative investigations and installations questioning the extent of space women can take up.

This exhibition brings to life the work from Ackland’s PhD, which explores running as a feminist act of resistance and empowerment. Through installations, reflective writing, drawings, films, and collective running projects, the work delves into the spatial and social dynamics of women’s running. It examines how feminist running practices allow women to physically and metaphorically extend their presence in public and private spaces. The exhibition emphasises the themes of ethnography, collective empowerment, and spatial justice, reflecting the thesis’s core question: how can women take up more space?

Highlights include the installation Running to Repair, which captures personal running experiences, and Taking Space, a collective running practice performed in public spaces. From solo runs to collective sprints with other women, the work reflects on the joy, strength, and defiance of feminist running and Ackland’s ongoing research. Whether you’re a runner or not, this is an invitation to think about how we move through the world and how we can demand more space – collectively.

About Sarah Ackland

Sarah Ackland is a creative practice researcher at Newcastle University, undertaking her work with a multidisciplinary lens, and she is a practicing architect at muf architecture/art. Sarah also guest lectures across the UK and Europe. Her research explores women in space through embodied, feminist and auto-ethnographic practices, using her body as a device to explore spaces, the city and degrees of access and care. Her work has been hosted by the Newcastle Contemporary Art Gallery and the Whitechapel Gallery in London.

She is the founder of the podcast 29% Equal which questioned ‘How to create meaningful change for women in architecture?’ through intergenerational conversations between women. Through her research she founded Taking Space, a curated research platform for women’s collective movement and sharing to understand the gendered limitations in public space and what can be done to create change. Sarah was shortlisted for the Archiboo Activist of the Year award in 2024.

Photo credit Morgane Bigualt