Guerrilla Girls Feminism

Inspired by the women's movement and rebelling against the male-dominated art scene of the 1960s,

“Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” was written with a passion both intense and familiar. Reading Nochlin’s words, I found myself thinking, several times, “I’d always wondered the same thing,” or “I feel the same way.” I even formulated some of my own thoughts on the subject, responding to the title question with another, asking, “What makes an artist an artist?” Upsettingly, it would seem it is not by her own choice or talent. It is decided by the world around her, including the men and “social institutions.” However, it would also appear that hope is always in reach for those who will wake up and grab it. Nochlin left us with this stirring advice:

Every girl growing up always use to play dress up in clothes as a childhood past time for fun. Cindy Sherman used that passed time as a way to create art with photography and is known for her talent of this act and taking self-portraits of it. Her ideas come stereotypes of women throughout past and present society. These self-portraits are known to “confront and explore the representations of women in society.” (Jankauskas).

In addition, I will examine the differences between male and female sexuality and how each tended to be perceived and treated by society. Then, I will look at prominent female artists and their personal experiences and beliefs on feminism and the female in their art focusing on how it tended to be received along how male artists responded to it. Mainly, I will be analyzing the clash of sexualized images in art, focusing on the differences not only between male made art versus female art, but the differences in the women’s art community, as well. What are the reasons and goals for women to use a “sexualized image” of women in their art versus

In the twenty first century there are a few men in this world that admits when you think of artist, you don’t typically think of women. Women rights and racism play a strong role when it comes to African American female artist. For decades’ African American woman have always had a permanent double bull’s eye on their back. Their skin and gender was their worst enemy. In the 1700 century women rights movements started to rise. But if you look up women right movements starting in the 1700 century, the face of women rights is predominantly white women. Between books and the internet, they show that it was mostly white women who helped woman rights. If we still struggle to shine light on African American Women now in the 21st century, you cannot

Art can be expressed in many forms but one of the best has got to be political art, as it expresses art in a relevant form for many to understand, it doesn’t require knowledge in history. It puts out a statement in a bold way so that people may better understand what is trying to be expressed. Many artists use art in topics like reproductive rights, equality, gun control, human rights, the environment and war to express desire for change. One of the most outspoken political artists is Barbara Kruger, who has had her work installed in many well-known museums. Kruger has become even more known because of her relevance using art to criticize well-known public figures like Kim Kardashian and George W. Bush, she has also been a proud supporter of reproductive rights. One of her most known works is “Your body is a battleground” which was printed in 1989 in her support for the “March for Women’s Lives”. To show the positive and negatives sides of the inner struggle, the good and the evil. She has a reputation of supporting feminism ideas but she hasn’t stopped there, she’s even had her work put on display in the Hirshhorn Museum. She has gotten the attention of The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times because of her distinctive contemporary works. The beauty of her art is that it relates to many, her art ranges from domestic violence to compulsive shopping and everything in-between, it is also really easy

Judy Chicago (artist, author, feminist and educator) has a career that now spans five decades. In the late 1960s, her inquiry into the history of women began a result of her desire to expose the truth of women’s experiences, both past and present. She still continues on a crusade to change the perception of women from our history, “Women’s history and women’s art need to become part of our cultural and intellectual heritage.” (Chicago, 2011) Through our history women - their struggles, accomplishments and contribution to history, have been overlooked, downplayed and even completely written out of a male dominated society and culture. In anthropologist Sherry Ortner’s 1974 essay “Is Female to Male as Nature Is to Culture?” she supports this view, writing “…woman is being identified with—or, if you will, seems to be a symbol of—something that every culture devalues,” (Ortner, 1974) Where Mendieta's work primarily came from a striving to belong and an understanding of where she came from, I feel that Chicago's aim was to find a place for all women, past and present in this world, starting with herself in the art world. Chicago did explore her peronal heritage in later works entitled 'Birth Project' and 'Holocaust Project'.

Throughout history many artistic works have been deemed "great" and many individuals have been labeled "masters" of the discipline. The question of who creates art and how is it to be classified as great or greater than another has commonly been addressed by scholars and historians. The last quarter of the 20th century has reexamined these questions based on the assertions that no women artists have ever created or been appreciated to the level of "greatness" that perpetually befalls their male counterparts. The position that society has institutionalized on women as unable to be anything but subordinate and unexpressive is a major contributor to this claim. Giving a brief history of gender discrimination in the art

In the today’s society, it may appear that women’s rights have been propelled forward by equal opportunity sanctions. However, taking a more concise look at different spectrums, such as the art world, it appears that many women are still being snubbed despite their artistic abilities. In

While Clement Greenberg suggested a narrow vision of modernism emphasizing “forms, flatness, and internal logic,” postmodernism artists refuted Greenberg’s principles which only focused on heterosexual men – through encouraging a wide array of voices to portray a direct message towards the wrongs of the society. In response to the 1970s feminist movement which was dominated by white women, Carrie Mae Weems’ “Kitchen Table Series” and Shirin Neshat’s “Rapture” present a lower class standing of women of color in the society through exhibiting complex identities. Both “Making Museums Moral Again” and “Talking art with Carrie Mae Weems” discuss hypocrisy enrooted in the “reality of museums that are ethically and politically compromised,” and artist

The curators of the exhibition “Vienna’s Shooting Girls: Jewish Women Photographers” were Iris Meder and Andrea Winklbaeuer. These independent further promoted the feminist notion of successful women and equity in the workforce and skilled trades. Their technique in presenting the photographs was not radical; however some of the material they chose to present was risqué. Meder and Winklbaeuer captured the individuality of the photographers with the selected pieces and chose works with natural positions in contrast to stiff, old-fashioned poses that museum-goers were acclined to seeing on the walls. This revival of female empowerment in German culture stands as a memory

One of the most poignant lines in her essay reads, “The fault, dear brothers, lies not in our stars, our hormones, our menstrual cycles or our empty internal spaces, but in our institutions and our education”. Essentially, the lack of great art produced by women is not an issue inherent to the sex, but one created by a society that refused to foster the education of women in the arts to a degree that they could produce great art. She argues that because the question of why there have never been women artists has been presented as a “problem” the issue has become convoluted. Rather than justifying themselves, Nochlin believes women need to focus on changing the societal institutions that re-enforce gender roles as normal and

The Guerrilla Girls speak about sexism in art galleries and the non appreciation of women 's art in the most prestigious galleries of New York. “a very big problem is the fact women don 't collect. ... Men buy the art and call the shots museums. Until women support women and collect each things will never change" (Withers 287). Women artists new to the art world were not accepted, men artist bought their art to present as their own. This way women artist do not get the chance to be recognized for their talent. Making the assumption women are only valued as the model but cannot aspire to be artists and create exceptional work as men would. This is of importance because only 1% or none of the art presented was of women artists. “not only in their appeals to principles of equality, but also, say, in their gesture of adopting the names of deceased female artists as aliases, a gambit tacitly

Frida Kahlo and Käthe Kollwitz were the alias names created by the original founders of the Guerilla Girls. Their true identity still remains a secret up to this day. Many new members joined them throughout the years but only a handful continued to stay anonymous while others began working in other professions. The Guerilla Girls would gather together for meetings every so often to criticize the art world. Kahlo described the meetings as “empowering” and says, “the more we laughed and made fun of the art world, the better we felt.” They hung posters to shame other sexist artist. Their first poster was in April 1985, directed towards the galleries with mainly male dominance art. Since then, their posters and campaign became well known that people

Barbara Kruger, artist and theorist, has directed and informed much of the curatorial project. Kruger’s perspectives on feminism speak to