The Source Family
Source Family women posing for Ya Ho Wa 13 album promotion
1974
35mm still/ digital file
Special Research Collections, UC Santa Barbara Library
Courtesy of Isis Aquarian Source Family Archives
For over two decades, filmmaker and curator Jodi Wille has acted as a primary cartographer for the American underground. Known for her empathetic deep dives into intentional communities—most notably in her documentary The Source Family—Wille’s work consistently bypasses the “kooky cult” headlines to find the sincere human yearning beneath the robes and rituals.
Her latest endeavor moves from the screen to the gallery floor with Utopia: Three Centuries of Sexuality in American Cults and Communes. Invited by the Museum of Sex, Wille has curated an expansive exhibition that bridges 300 years of history through 300 rare artifacts. From the celibacy of the Shakers to the “complex marriage” of the Oneida Community and the Neopagan experiments of the 1970s, the show reframes these groups not as failed experiments, but as vital “think tanks” for human freedom. Read more.