This book would be an excellent textbook for a Women In Art course. It doesn't have much information on centuries prior to the twentieth and largely focuses on art, artists, and issues from the 1960's on, so it wouldn't do as the only text for such a course. But this is all you need for late twentieth century concerns.
The early essays are dripping with Freudian psychology and psychoanalytical social criticism. The issues surrounding why it took so long for there to be a sense of equality of greatness amongst artists of all genders is explored deeply. The issues of representation of all races and sexual orientations then follows. The book stops just short of discussing the newest research on intersex persons (persons born with an extra chomosome, among others {XXY, for example}).
For a movement that was intending to create a sense of equality, feminist theory highlights both the vast differences as well as the profound similarities between the perception processes of men and women. This includes both the perceptions of and different approaches to art as well as life. Yet, when all is said and done, more recent artists are primarily interested not in these issues, but more a sense of having their work judged based on its quality, not their gender.
The only disappointment I have in this book is one that no other book addresses either. So, I mean this only as a minor criticism. In short, the book does not answer the following: Is ther an intersex mind state? Feminist theory either didn't reach the point of asking this in time for the extensive research put into this book or it has come to its conclusion and will transform gradually into a whole other movement.
The art chosen to represent the above ideas and explorations is top quality. The reproductions are sharp and colorful. I would recommend this book to anyone with interests in women in art or in feminist theory.
Product Description:Feminism has had a crucial impact on late twentieth-century art, inspiring some of the most pioneering developments in sculpture, painting, performance, photography, film and installation. The art world has been transformed by feminists who at the same time have been among its chief critics. Feminism has redefined the very terms of late twentieth-century art: it has exposed assumptions about gender; it has politicized the link between private and public; it has stressed the specificity of art marked by gender, race, age and class. Selected by editor and researcher Helena Reckitt, this collection presents the rich diversity of art informed by feminism from the 1960s to the start of the twenty-first century. Not just a comprehensive history, the book juxtaposes works by many artists who are not usually shown or discussed together, opening up new connections between key figures. Peggy Phelan, among the best known contemporary feminist theorists, surveys the history of feminist art, opening up new perspectives on the work of artists ranging from Georgia O'Keeffe and Louise Bourgeois to Cindy Sherman and Pipilotti Rist. The Documents include the key critical texts of each period, ranging from the writings of Simone de Beauvoir, to the pioneering art criticism of Lucy R Lippard, to Craig Owens' feminist-derived contributions to postmodern criticism, as well as many important previously unpublished artists' statements and interviews.
Amazon.com Review:No question about it,
Art and Feminism is
the basic reference book for feminist art. Part of Phaidon's excellent Themes and Movements series, it surveys three decades of a tumultuous history with a brief but inclusive essay, reproductions of works by 155 artists, and lengthy excerpts from groundbreaking texts by artists and theorists. The challenge posed by a movement that spans several artistic generations and includes many contentious players is ably met by essayist Peggy Phelan, professor of performance studies at New York University. She illuminates the intertwined workings of feminist politics and literary criticism, psychoanalysis, race and queer theory with clarity and a refreshing absence of doctrinaire pronouncements.
The illustrations are organized chronologically under sometimes quirky headings, beginning with "Too Much" (late-'60s performance pieces by such pioneering figures as Carolee Schneemann, Miriam Schapiro, Eva Hesse, Louise Bourgeois, and Yayoi Kusama). The final section, "Femmes de Siècle," contains work from the '90s by Coco Fusco, Kara Walker, Mona Hatoum, Jenny Saville, and others exploring "collective memories ... and traumas." Essays range from the raw invective of Valerie Solanas's "Scum Manifesto" (1967) to the reasoned arguments of Adrian Piper's "The Triple Negation of Colored Women Artists" (1990). While some may argue that the book could be more inclusive--it deals overwhelmingly with women artists who exhibit in major Western cultural centers--it offers an unparalleled breadth of reference. Irked by the perfect bodies of many feminist artists who use nudity in their work, I was struck by the poignancy and honesty of Hannah Wilke--a glamorous figure in '70s and '80s performance art--who chose to memorialize her bald, bloated self in photographs months before her untimely death from cancer in 1993. --Cathy Curtis
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