The Guerrilla Girls will unveil a new artwork interrogating sexism of European art scene at Whitechapel Gallery (standard.co.uk).
“Feminist art activists The Guerrilla Girls will create a new artwork to be displayed in Whitechapel Gallery this October. The group have been confronting sexism in art galleries for over thirty years, and will use their commission at Whitechapel Gallery to interrogate the European art scene. In 1986, they created a poster called It’s Even Worse In Europe; their new piece will aim to find out if this is still the case. … A famous poster made by the group in 1989 asked ‘Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?’ after finding that less than 5% of the artists displayed in the New York museum were women, but 85% of the museum’s nudes were female.”
Indeed, and sincerely respectful as I am to their undoubted talent they are more than welcome to even up the score, for, I fear, even though last time I looked gallery attendance is pretty equally male and female, market forces and that distasteful yet very much there thing called law of supply and demand—a demand which there obviously is—may be their real enemy as if they are going to try give male nudes outside of the fig leaf the classical nature of sculpture gives it then I fear their audience may well be expecting something ala Tom of Finland. It may also be worth pondering why the girl who takes her top off on Twitter gets thousands of followers while topless chap with his Dewgong out is relegated to ambush oppotunity on Chatroulette instead (post below).
For sure, it’s similarly so why male fashion models—even those with magnum or blue steel ala Zoolander—are paid a fraction of that of female models, and I didn’t create the audience, only what it will spare me the time to take a look at.
Indeed, if it is not your cup of Rosy Lee you are very welcome to read the “serious issues” some often say I should address instead and indeed such social issues over in my quirky philosophical deconstruction of latest news stories, This Is No Cave! No? As you please then.
And of immensely talented female artist I surely can name, spare a thought for poor ol’ prickly personality’ed mother of American modernism Georgia O’Keeffe, asided there in the article for a retrospective at the Tate Modern, who, you know, explicitly said she did not paint her blooming flowers as being anything lady-like “sexual” like they are often suggested, indeed, rejecting the Freudian interpretations heaped upon her celebrating as originator of “female iconography” and refusing to cooperate with any projects presenting it so, perhaps seeming to feel it was appropriating for a cause which—although she likely suported—she had not aimed to deliver message to: Miley Cyrus, planned parenthood pokeage and Georgia O’Keeffe—since when did an artist’s own interpretation of their work matter frickin’ squat when culture chooses to champion and see it in a particular way (celebritytonguedigest.blogspot.co.uk).
Much as another female artist of monumental stature Frida Khalo rejected the “ribbon around a bomb” epithet (latinacelebdigest.blogspot.co.uk) Surrealism’s André Breton tried to impose and indeed, painted nudes (fridakahlo.org) as well as a variety of other things in her life herself; much it seems in art as everything else, is in the expectant eye of the beholder, and you could ask does life (or culture) imitate art or is it the other way around?
Recent/related stories
- The Guardian’s Amanda Vickery asks “why are there so few paintings by women in public galleries?” (Pick of the Week 21st May 2014)
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