Elise Ottesen-Jensen (Ottar) föreläser

The photographer Anna Riwkin had her studio in the same building on Kungsgatan in Stockholm as Elise Ottesen-Jensen (“Ottar”), the famous pioneer of sexual education in Sweden and co-founder of the Swedish Association for Sesuality Education, RFSU. In 1938, they travelled north together. Riwkin captured Ottar addressing tent meetings in villages and towns in northern Sweden. This photographic series shows her agitating for abortion rights, sex education and contraceptives, only to hop in her Chevrolet and head for the next meeting. Ottar was also a politically committed syndicalist. Together with Moa Martinsson, a former student at the Citizens’ School for Women at Fogelstad, she wrote articles and answered letters in a women’s column in the newspaper Arbetaren.