This investigation will examine a few key works by the anonymous female artist group know in popular culture as the Guerrilla Girls. In this essay it will reveal several prominent themes within the groups works that uncover the racial and gender inequalities in politics, art and pop culture with the use of humor. These collaborating artists work and operate with a variety of mediums, their works display a strong message concerned with activism connected by humor allowing the Guerrilla Girls to communicate and resonate a more powerful message to the viewer. The ways in which this collaborating group has employed many questions and facts against the hierarchy and historical ideologies which have exploited women and their roles in art. This investigation will allow the reader to identify three areas in which the Guerrilla Girls apply a certain forms of humor to transform society’s view on the prominent issue of gender in the art world. These specific ploys that are performed by the Guerrilla Girls are in the way they dress, the masks they wear, pseudonymous names of dead women artists and the witty factual evidence in their works. These are all examples to evoke audiences in challenging not only the art society which dictates the value and worth of women in art but also to confront yourself and your own beliefs in a way that makes audiences rethink these growing issues.
Over the last twenty years the Guerrilla Girls have established a strong following due to the fact that they challenged and consistently exhibited a strong supportive subject matter that defies societal expectations. In an interview “We reclaimed the word girl because it was so often used to belittle grown women. We also wanted to make older feminists sit up and n...
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...witty comical banter helps spread the understanding of the underlying themes behind the humor. It makes it easier for the artists to connect with the audience about feminism without an aggressive and hostile approach to the work. I believe viewers are more likely to communicate upon the works of the Guerrilla Girls with one another in society when they take on a more comedic approach. This investigation has examined the Guerrilla Girls through direct connection to the inequalities of compliance of power over women in the art world. Several themes were highlighted within society that reinstated these cultural norms of gender and sex within the institutions of art. With a variety of forms used by the Guerrilla Girls to redefine women's identity in history they were able to break down such barriers that stood in the way which denied the prosperity of female artists.
Sexism is very real, even in the least patriarchal societies of the world. From a western hemisphere point of view, the lives of women and young girls that are described in Nawal el Saadawi’s “In Camera” and Hanan al-Shaykh’s “The Women’s Swimming Pool” is almost unbelievable. Although these stories do not tell the whole story of women’s lives in these areas, it gives readers a general idea of how politics, social opportunities, and male privilege is overbearing in their way of life. While “In Camera” is has a more dark, and mature theme than “The Women’s Swimming Pool,” it is obvious that both relate in the way that their protagonists both suffer from the unnecessary and unexpected burden of being born a female.
Considering that traditional society looked down on women as inferior to men, the female roles in each work challenge the status quo and make their audiences’ eyes wearier to the society they might have previously backed without question.
The way the Gurlesque applies mockery and exaggeration through a feminist perspective is more often than not directly linked with a subverted language, a language that purposefully deviates from what is standardized as “the proper language for a woman”. Refusing such standardization and responding to masculine “high-art”, the poems exhibit a political stance through the Gurlesque which employs the feminist understanding that multiplicities and even conflicting alternatives could very well coexist (Irigaray 28-29). The aesthetics of the distasteful comes into question in that regard and constitutes the third completing element of the Gurlesque. The Gurlesque copies the masculine culture without identifying with it, that is to say, it kitschifies
Power, especially in the hands of females, can be a force for immense societal changes. Director Sciamma plays with the role of power in the lives of the four girls, predominantly in the character of Lady. Lady’s sense of control, stems from winning hand on hand fights, but the opinion of the men around her lays the foundation of this empowerment. The more fights Lady wins, the more the men appear to respect her, yet as feminist Simone de Beauvoir explains “[n]o matter how kindly, how equally men treated me when I tried to participate in politics, when it came right down to it, they had more rights, so they had more power than I did (Simone de Beauvoir - The Second Sex- ix),” the “power” Lady obtained was provisional. Lady’s power was directly tied to the opinion of the men around her, in this scene, a portion of the boys sits on stairs physically higher than Lady, invoking a sense of power hierarchy and control. The boys only valued Lady when she successfully participated in the their world of violence, but this participation came with boundaries as “[w]omen can never become fully socialized into patriarchy- which in turn causes man to fear women and leads then, on the one hand, to establish very strict boundaries between their own sex and the female sex (Feminist theory 142).” The men had never truly incorporated Lady into their group, she had just
During the Art Deco era the calla lily became one of the most popular flowers around. Whether in florist shops or on artist canvases the calla lily became a recurring theme. Like many flowers before it the calla lily came to be more than a flower on its own but it represented the idea of femininity. The calla lily was used by artists such as Tamara de Lempicka, Diego Rivera and Georgia O’Keeffe as a symbol of femininity and feminism. Through examining their works, in relation to their own lives and the events of the day, I will explore how the calla lily came to represent a new type on femininity and feminism.
The Guerrilla Girls, a collective of anonymous female artists, who challenge the public to think through their art work. Hiding behind the names of famous female artist and gorilla mask these women seek justice and equality for female artist. By producing posters, books, and performances, the Guerrilla Girls reach for the goal of exposing acts of sexism and racism in politics, the art world, film, and culture at large. The group’s method of exaggerating the rhetorical strategies used to propagate the normalcy of male domination in the art world translate well to their critiques of popular and political culture, and that this method is an important aspect of feminist discourse today. The deep history of the Guerrilla Girls and the ideas behind
... annoyed them to great degree. They used 3S women to describe the first generation of the modern women: Single, Seventies (the first group of lost lady were born in 1970s), Stuck (to laugh at them being stuck in relationship). It is totally unfair and unreasonable to use this label underplaying the independent feminist only due to females threaten to masculinity-dominated world. Being jealous and uneven to evaluate the huge leap made by female is a reflection of snobbish masculinity and has no positive impact on the development process of human being. On the other hand, this negative and unfair label can be considered as compliments or rewards of women’s efforts in the last few decades of fighting for a better life. But the ridiculous expressions in this book show the dominant idea is deep-rooted in people’s mind and female still have a long way to go in the future.
During this period, the world was rocked by a socialist movement characterized by a counterattack against nonfigurative art and a reversion to figurative art, a change that enabled artists to deliver social messages clearly. Kahlo’s paintings started receiving global attention from the 1970s. Feminism in art at the time suggested that women’s physical characteristics were women’s own space, distinguished from men’s. Her paintings honestly and comprehensively expressed her personal experiences and emotions, to which only women could relate. Self-portrait was a recurring theme in her paintings, which depicted women as active observers of their inner being rather than as passive objects of men’s attraction. From this perspective, Kahlo’s pieces are extremely pioneering (Deffebach, 2015). The feminist movement provided opportunities for the discovery of more female artists in the world of art; this movement helped her paintings see the light of day. During the period when male chauvinism prevailed, Kahlo stood against conservative society with her strong character and personality; she strived to create a new era and tread the path of a pioneer. In this respect, Kahlo was an artist who had great influence on improving women’s social
Women have spent a large amount of time throughout the 20th century fighting for liberation from a patriarchal form that told them that they must be quiet and loyal to their husbands and fathers. For the duration of this essay, I will be discussing how the “Modern Woman” image that appeared through the Art Deco style — that emulated ideas such as the femme fatale and masqueraded woman, and presented new styles to enhance women’s comfortability and freedom — is still prevalent and has grown in contemporary art and design since. Overall I will describing to you how fashion, sexuality, and the newly emerged ‘female gaze’, and how these tie in together — in both periods of time — to produce what can be described as powerful femininity.
In this essay by Joanna Frueh, she discusses the work of a feminist artist named Hannah Wilke who wrote “A Retrospective”. In Wilke essay, she discusses how the image of women genitals are not recognized as what they are because it invokes thoughts of sexuality and corruption. Frueh discusses how powerful the way in which Wilke try to make people aware of what women genitals are, and that the word cunt, “will acknowledge female sexuality as a positive, assertive force” as Wilke described the word in her essay.
These cultural strictures come in a number of forms. First, the artist attacks intellectual conformity, choosing art over all other means of self-expression even though it is not widespread in his or her society. Though it is not explicitly stated - and is perhaps even subconscious - the artist chooses art over either academe or high society. The artist questions society's customs, making this choice explicit in their daily actions. The artist rejects ostentatious displays of wealth and the cultural emphasis on money, replacing it with a frugal simplicity more conducive to authentic experience. Finally, the artist calls into question the cultural construct most important to any understanding of human interaction - the binary conception of gender.
Nothing has more of an effect to the controversial conversation of women’s liberation than literature. The subtle cues from Cosmopolitan emphasizing femininity: beauty, sensuality, appreciating the female body… Self-help guidebooks persisting the woman to let go and just be free for once. It is liberating for the woman to see such medias to act upon what they were thinking and to even go beyond that. Talks of Have clean hair but no body hair, smile on cue, the right amount of gossip, tight but fitting clothing and lingerie, perfume, good health and enthusiasm...
The Guerrilla Girls have had their ups and downs, their message against discrimination has only widened and intensified: Both their support of equal representation of queer artists and artists of color, along with their focus on the flow on money through art channels have become key platforms in their fact-finding mission. In March 2012 alone, the Guerrilla Girls had two new projects hitting the streets and piercing minds, as they label themselves the conscious of the art world. (Guerrilla girls, inc, 2016) The message being sent by the Guerrilla Girls grew as not only did they’re updated museum guide stocked with the recent salaries, disproportions in pay, creating even more discussion about gender inequality in the art world. Within an interview
Throughout history society has been controlled by men, and because of this women were exposed to some very demanding expectations. A woman was expected to be a wife, a mother, a cook, a maid, and sexually obedient to men. As a form of patriarchal silencing any woman who deviated from these expectations was often a victim of physical, emotional, and social beatings. Creativity and individuality were dirty, sinful and very inappropriate for a respectful woman. By taking away women’s voices, men were able to remove any power that they might have had. In both Alice Walker’s “The Color Purple” and Kate Chopin’s “The Awakening”, we see that there are two types of women who arise from the demands of these expectations. The first is the obedient women, the one who has buckled and succumbed to become an empty emotionless shell. In men’s eyes this type of woman was a sort of “angel” perfect in that she did and acted exactly as what was expected of her. The second type of woman is the “rebel”, the woman who is willing to fight in order to keep her creativity and passion. Patriarchal silencing inspires a bond between those women who are forced into submission and/or those who are too submissive to maintain their individuality, and those women who are able and willing to fight for the ability to be unique.
Feminism, especially the narratives and images of feminist protest, has been central to my understanding of the world since I was a teenager. My first introduction to feminist politics was through the book Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution by Sara Marcus. This in-depth presentation of the Riot Grrrl punk movement taught me about feminism’s Third Wave and sparked my interest in the rhetoric of feminist protest. After reading this book, feminism became the lens through which I viewed everything, from politics to academics.