Art Lovers discussion

Beauty Interrupted
Mary Schepisi
2011

"Feminist art, which grew out of the feminist art movement of the late 1960s and 1970s, criticized the gender ideals of the early 20th century as well as the art-history canon, using art to create a dialogue between the viewer and the artwork through a feminist lens. Rather than creating artwork for the visual pleasure of the viewer, feminist art aimed to make the viewer question the social and political norms of society in the hopes that it would inspire change towards what feminism is all about -ending sexism/oppression."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminis...

what do you all think about the claim made by Linda Nochlin that there are no great female artists? she means that no women painters are accepted in the arthistorical canon. I'm writing my thesis about this subject. You can find the article by simply googling Nochlin - why are there no great female artists

There are many. Louise Nevelson. Freida Kahlo. Marisol. Georgia O'Keefe. Granny Moses to name a few.

Linda Nochlin seems to be particularly ill informed if she doesn't know from art history, Louise Nevelson, Freida Kahlo, Hannah Hoch, Marisol, Granny Moses, and that's just for starters.

I think it is important to mention that she says that there are a lot of GOOD female artists, but no great ones. There is, for example no female ecquivalent of Michelangelo, Rembrandt or Da Vinci. She says that is due to social circumstamces in the past

so she doesn't say women aren't AS good as men, but not extraordinary, causing a huge change in art history

Italian Renaissance painter Artemisia Gentileschi (who I learned about from reading a novel -- a pretty good novel).

I would say that Louise Nevelson is better than any male American artist from the 20th c.

If you want, I will keep you up-to date about my findings in my research. There are a lot of examples of good female artists, my case-study will be about Berthe Morisot. I will also look up the suggestions you all made!

@10 - Nevelson's art has termites. But she was a flamboyant actress, for which she's loved. Those turbans and ski-jump fake eye-lashes ! ~~ I laud the other Louise : Louise Bourgeois. Yes!!

I'm just perusing past folders and threads. I just read this one out of pure curiosity of what has been said.

Though this was posted in March, I want to address it to Lars

@Lars
How is your research going? I am interested in what you've learned and found!

I hope I can open up this thread again and hear more of everyone's insights and comments. Everything everyone says is always interesting and I learn a lot from everyone in the group. So thank you!

Lars wrote: "what do you all think about the claim made by Linda Nochlin that there are no great female artists? she means that no women painters are accepted in the arthistorical canon. I'm writing my thesis a..."

I found the essay by Nocklin in a Word document. Here is the link if anyone is interested. I think this thread is rather interesting and could be controversial.

http://deyoung.famsf.org/files/whynog...

Geoffrey wrote: "Linda Nochlin seems to be particularly ill informed if she doesn't know from art history, Louise Nevelson, Freida Kahlo, Hannah Hoch, Marisol, Granny Moses, and that's just for starters."

She was not ill informed. Quite active as an art historian and a writer. Great credentials. Read the article. She’s talking about why, for all sorts of cultural reasons, we’ve ended up with so few women artists whom the establishment and historians have considered great.

I was in grad school in the 70s and Nochlin was considered very important and this article, which was also published as a small book (which I own) was influential and eye-opening.

I watched this documentary about Artemisia Gentileschi two days ago. Just thought of sharing it.

Artemisia Undaunted:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHVey...