Speaking out- Guerrilla girls

“Their very anonymity makes clear that they are fighting for women as a caste, but their message celebrates each woman’s uniqueness. By insisting on a world as if women mattered, and also the joy of getting there, the Guerrilla Girls pass the ultimate test; they make us both laugh and fight, both happy and strong” - Gloria Steinem

They are funny, they are witty, they fight discrimination. They are the Guerrilla Girls and yes, they are awesome.

The Guerrilla Girls are a group of women artists formed in the mid 1980s. They consist of women professionals who challenge the discrimination against women in art galleries, museums, and art criticism. Through the use of posters, the group began to raise awareness about the significant amount of discrimination against women in the art world. The posters put it simply and honestly: women artists are not equally represented in the art world (along with many other facets of society including politics, film and culture) where racism and sexism is rampant. Incognito the Guerrilla Girls posted their “‘public service announcements’ as [they] called them,…up and down the streets of SoHo and the East Village in New York City, neighborhoods in which artists lived and exhibited their work” (Lustig). The posters target specific art museums or artists and point out the blatant discrimination happening in museums and exhibitions.

Most interestingly about the girls, they wear actual gorilla masks (hence the name). According to the Guerilla Girls, “we wear gorilla masks to keep the focus on the issues rather than our personalities” (The Guerilla Girls, 7). The masks also provide a sense of anonymity and allow the women to be the “feminist counterparts to the mostly male tradition of anonymous do-gooders like Robin Hood, Batman, and the Lone Ranger” (The Guerrilla Girls, 7). Through their anonymity they represent a group of feminists fighting earnestly for equality in the realm of art and artists. They also use a significant amount of humor in their efforts, which has proven to be extremely effective while simultaneously proving that feminists really can be funny. This excerpt is from the Guerrilla Girls at a national convention at the College Art Association in 1986:

I’m a Guerrilla Girl and I’m not incensed that the Museum of Modern Art showed only 13 women of the 169 artists in the International Survey of Painting and Sculpture show or that the Carnegie International (Pittsburg) had only four out of 42. I know these figures occurred by chance. There was no sexism, conscious or unconscious, at work.

I’m a Guerrilla Girl and I think that the art world is perfect and I would never think of complaining about any of the wonderful people in it. After all, women artists make fully one whole third of what male artists make, so what’s there to be mad about? I mean, it’s not nice to get angry. I wouldn’t dream about getting angry. Thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day to listen to this. (Lustig)

Since their beginnings, the Guerrilla Girls have posted several posters each year, published books, appeared in conferences and conventions, performed on a variety of stages and continued to fight discrimination. Nevertheless, their tactics are quite aggressive. Personally, I feel this works both for and against them. Because their posters are so very forthright and clear, it slaps people in the face and gets them thinking. It creates accountability in both museums as well as artists and forces those involved to look at facts of discrimination. However, it also has the potential to create a backlash against the Guerrilla Girls themselves and create tokenism within exhibitions (to which the Guerrilla Girls, of course, made a poster to point out). Some critics have even looked to their masks as taking on “unintended racial assumptions…[and] had become a projections of racist fantasies and a perpetuation of the sexual allure of the veiled woman” (Lustig).

What do you think about the Guerrilla Girls? Do their tactics seem fitting for their activism? And how do you feel about their overall message?

Lustig, Suzanne. "How and Why Did the Guerrilla Girls Alter the Art World Establishment in New York City, 1985-1995?." (2002): n. pag. Web. .

Images from:

http://www.cinestatic.com/infinitethought/2010/04/bidisha-on-tokenism.html

http://womhist.alexanderstreet.com

Looking back- Art History and Women

“…even though making it as an artist isn’t easy for anyone, the history of art has been a history of discrimination.” -The Guerrilla Girl’s

I felt that beginning the blog with a brief overview of women in art history will provide a good basis for how we look at and analyze current feminist art and movements. As I mentioned, this is will be a very, very brief look into the past of western art history and women.

Although women artists have obviously provided a significant amount of art to society and the general public, art history reflects a history of misogyny, racism, and discrimination. Women artists have been left out, forgotten, and deliberately erased from artistic historical contexts and therefore, we are left with a very patriarchal view of art history.

Nevertheless, “despite prejudice, there have been lots of women artists throughout Western history” (The Guerrilla Girls, 8). Several reports point to women painters, sculptors, and artists as the creators of great works of art throughout time. For example, the Bayeux Tapestry from 1066 represents one of the most important medieval art objects to this day, and scholars agree that the 200 foot long banner depicting the conquest of England by Norman king William the Conqueror and everyday life was embroidered by a group of women. Hildegard von Bingen, a nun in Germany in the 12^th century commissioned artists to illuminate their visions (which were later dubbed as heretical by the catholic church) into pieces of art, which now provide a glimpse into the life of such a maverick nun.

The Bayeux Tapestry

Women artists have also been lost in history as their work is attributed to male artists. Often times financial concerns are deeply engrained in this misattribution and since “the monetary value of works of art is inextricably bound up in their attribution to ‘named’ artists, the work of many women has been absorbed into that of their better-known male colleagues” (Chadwick, 22). For instance, Judith Leyster, a prominent seventeenth-century painter, “was almost lost from history from the end of that century until 1893, when Cornelius Hofstede de Groot discovered her monogram on The Happy Couple (1630) which he had just sold to the Louvre as a Frans Hals” (Chadwick, 22). Although Leyster drew inspiration from and modeled many of her paintings from Hals’ style, there is a difference. However, Hals’ works were valued significantly more than Leyster’s, and, therefore, the overeager art historian was more than happy to see a Hals painting, especially those historians “committed to a view women’s production as obviously inferior to those of men. ‘Some women artists tend to emulate Frans Hals,’ noted James Laver in 1964, ‘but the vigorous brushstrokes of the master were beyond their capability. One only has to look at the work of a painter like Judith Leyster to detect the weakness of the feminine hand” (Chadwick, 24). Nevertheless, after the first discovery of the misattribution of Leyster’s work to Hals’, seven paintings were reattributed to Leyster.

The Happy Couple, Judith Leyster

Some feminists, however, ask the questions if there actually were any great women artists. I know many of you feminists are reading this saying “uh…what!?” but Linda Nochlin asks this exact question in her essay “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?”. According to her essay, “there have been no great women artists, so far as we know, although there have been many interesting and good ones who have not been sufficiently investigated or appreciated…” (Nochlin, 5). Nochlin sites society and the art education system throughout history as the main reason why women have not succeeded in art. She asks, “is it not the kinds of demands and expectations placed before…women—the amount of time necessarily devoted to social functions, the very kinds of activities demanded—simply made total devotion to professional art production out of the question, and indeed unthinkable both for upper-class males and for women generally” (Nochlin, 10). Society’s pressure on women and their actions led to an underdeveloped representation of women artists.

Whether great women artists were left out of art history or whether there actually were no great women artists in history, art history is one told predominantly of male artists. This attitude has continued to carry over into today with galleries and museums showing mainly male artist’s works. However, groups such as the Guerrilla Girls and movements such as the Feminist Art Movement (both of which I will discuss in later posts), have brought attention to this discrimination.

Do you feel that Nochlin is right in saying that there have been no great women art? Or have women artists simply been pushed out of the spotlight?

The Guerrilla Girls, First. The Guerrilla Girls Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art. New York: the Penguin Group, 1998. Print.

Chadwick, Whitney. Women, Art, and Society. 4th ed. New York: Thames & Hudson Ltd., 2007. Print

Nochlin, Linda. "Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?." Art and Sexual Politics. Ed. Thomas B. Hess and Elizabeth C. Baker. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1973. Print.

Images from:

http://www.arthistoryspot.com/2009/10/bayeux-tapestry/

http://tolearn.net/hum300/assignments.htm

Welcome!

My name is Kira Cheshier, and welcome to my blog. I am currently studying Art, International Studies, and German with a minor in Women’s Studies at the University of Wyoming. This blog will highlight my deep passion for both women’s studies as well as art and although this topic is enormous (believe me, the amount of resources available will boggle your mind) I will try to provide a variety of an overview of history, artists, as well as contemporary issues. First, however, I would like to discuss my personal feminist beliefs and understandings.

I look at feminism as a way of living, not just a belief system or movement. Feminism to me means accepting and understanding differences through experiences and education. Over the past four years, I have had the amazing opportunity to learn about different cultures and groups of peoples and this is most definitely reflected in my feminism. I believe as humans we have the right to be treated equally and fairly in society. I believe acceptance and acknowledgment of differences is important to grow as a community and society, and without these, we cannot progress. And to me, education is one of the most important elements in understanding. The more we educate ourselves about each other, the more we can understand our positions in life. Now understanding is much different than knowing and although we can understand each other, we will never be able to fully know each other and the hardships, restrictions, and confinements we feel in society. With that said, I feel feminism provides an opportunity for everyone to start to understand our society and the people within. Our society is patriarchal which is reflected in our systems and institutions. Because of this, women and other minority groups have a special view of the world which should be seen and honored. I believe there are differences among women and men, mostly created by society and social factors, however, these differences should be acknowledged and equally valued.

To me art holds a special place in society. It is a form of expression and is able to convey a message from the artist to the viewer. Often times, the message a viewer receives is not the exact same message an artist has sent because our perceptions are formed by our own personal experiences and ideas, which I believe only adds to the beauty of art. Art, and feminist art in particular, is a powerful form of communication that can change a society and an individual all at once. Therefore, to me the intersection of feminism and art is so very natural; they are both powerful and have the ability to change a nation.

I hope you enjoy the following posts!