Heavy-hitting shows dedicated to feminist art are happening now on both coasts. But they stand in stark contrast to a past deeply in thrall to man-made art.Call it the year of the woman ... in the visual arts! With symposiums, heavy-hitting shows on the East and West Coast, and a smattering of smaller exhibits around the country all dedicated to feminist art happening now, it's a veritable gender insurgency waged on the hallowed white walls of the art world.
A small fraction of the timing was mere serendipity. That's what curator Connie Butler says anyway about "WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution," a survey of international feminist art produced during the 1970s, on view now at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. She conceived of the show over a decade ago, she says, when she noticed emerging artists, like Matthew Barney, referencing the work of that period "with no real understanding of the history."
The rest of this confluence was pure conspiracy. Activist patrons, artists, curators, and scholars organized these events to make a big publicity splash. And the Feminist Art Project (FAP) at Rutgers University in New Jersey, initiated in late 2005 by Judy Chicago and the late feminist art writer Arlene Raven, was its fountainhead. Organizers there are promoting feminist art's reach through 2009 with a series of publications, symposia, and exhibitions.
Read More
