Women of Our Time (Post 4)

When approaching the topic of women in art history one must be aware of how history is told and recorded based on the context of which it exists. Whitney Chadwick presents this notion of subjectivity in her book, Women, Art, and Society, stating one must have a ”knowledge of gender" (Chadwick 18). Consequently, an individual must have a conscious understanding of the roles that were expected of women in order to fully understand the magnitude and the context of the art that is produced by women or of women. As women, many authors did not sign their names, limiting our knowledge of the extinctive work done by women, “anonymity was the norm, if not the rule” (Chadwick 62).

Illumination- Liber Scivias showing Hildegard receiving a vision

 From the Hildegardis-Codex, 'The Universe' 1151

Hildegard of Bingen was one of the first women in recorded history to significantly impact the Western world through her artwork, literature, and theological visions. She was educated in the Benedictine Abbey convent and in the convent system women flourished, alongside Monks, nuns contributed to the production of numerous manuscripts. Hildegard took her vows of a Benedictine nun in 1117 (Chadwick 59). At that time a woman’s role was not always clearly defined; many times there were 

inconsistencies on what was expected of a woman and what was asked of a woman. The Benedictine Rule, a work that expressed the distinction of gender roles in the church, is an example of that contradiction. One aspect of the rule showcased women as, “sexual threats to male chastity” and the other provides an equal base for women in terms of spirituality and religious studies (Chadwick 45).

Women’s roles were not necessarily privatized; however, access to education depended on noble birth. In the convent, Hildegard was offered a choice outside of marriage and motherhood and she was given an opportunity to learn. However, though she was able to learn, women were rarely presented the opportunity to teach. Hildegard did not overtly challenge the women’s role in the church, instead she prescribed to an ideology of female “otherness” (Chadwick 59). “Hildegard wrote sixty-three hymns, a miracle play, and a long treatise of nine books on the  different natures of trees, plants, animals, birds, fish, minerals, metals, and substances” (Chadwick 59). Hildegard claims to have experienced great visions where she was delivered the words of God allow her to gain influence over the religious and scientific content she was producing, eventually even getting a blessing from the Pope. She recorded many of her visions in her book Scivias, a work that took her over ten years to complete (Guerrilla Girls 24).

Judy Chicago.The Dinner Party (Hildegarde of Bingen place setting), 1974–79

             Abstract Expressionism or The New York School was first coined by Clement Greenberg and his followers, or as he preferred “action painting” or "American-style Painting.” As a theorist and an art critic, Greenberg defined what he thought art should be and what he believed it should become. Developed from an influence of Surrealism and Cubism, the movement was largely based in New York City, pulling New York on the map as a leading figure of western art. This modernist movement and style did not reflect much of the work done by women of the time, but their work is representative of their relationship to and against Abstract Expressionism. Lee Krasner was substantial female contributor to this movement (Chadwick 323).

Lee Krasner, Noon, 1947

Lee Krasner with an early version of Stop and Go, 1949

Krasner attended the Women’s Art School of Cooper Union and the National Academy of Design. She was married to Jackson Pollock, a significant figure in Abstract Expressionism, who began to focus on this “action painting” after 1947, only nine years before his death. Krasner carried on his legacy both with his work and with her own (Chadwick 322).She struggled to define herself as an artist, to differentiate herself from her husband, and to separate herself from being identified exclusively by her gender as a painter. She studied under Hans Hoffmann, who has notably stated, “this painting is so good you’d never know it was done by a woman” (Chadwick 323). Krasner attended the boys’ clubs, like the Cedar Bar and some of her most notable paintings are included in her series called, Little Things.

Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner in Pollock's studio, ca. 1950

Yoko Ono performing Cut Piece, 1965

The late 1960s and early 1970s dominate ideals of Modernism began to fade. An artist’s work was no longer exclusive to the mainstream galleries and deal systems and many rejected the glamorous and embraced the accessible. As a member of the Fluxus Group, Yoko Ono, a Japanese born artist exemplified this conversion. As an avant-garde visual artist working in New York, Ono constructed her first instructional piece in 1957 (Azito). Ono is a feminist and a peace activist. In her 1965 she recreated a visual performance she originally performed in Japan in 1964 at Carnegie Recital Hall in New York City. In Cut Piece, “the artist sat kneeling on the concert hall stage, wearing her best suit of clothing, with a pair of scissors placed on the floor in front of her. Members of the audience were invited to approach the stage, one at a time, and cut a bit of her clothes off – which they were allowed to keep”(Concannon). As relevant to the movement Ono and other artist similar to her used their bodies in their work, they used nontraditional materials, and they set feminist political agendas (Chadwick 338-39).

Yoko Ono - Cut Piece 1965

Born in California in 1926, Betye Saar is an American assemblage artist that is known for mixed media collages and she is a self-proclaimed a recycler. She is also known for her bold displays of stereotypic black images that she reimagines in her art as a form of protest. She states, “I am intrigued with combining the remnant of memories, fragments of relics and ordinary objects, with the components of technology. It’s a way of delving into the past and reaching into the future simultaneously” (Sackler). Much of Saar’s work challenges societal norms of gender and racism. Her signature piece, The Liberation of Aunt Jemima, which was first exhibited in 1972, was presented in a wood box showing a black “mammy” figure in kerchief holding a broom in one hand and a rifle in the other (Chadwick 342). The image itself represents that racism remains deeply rooted in American society, and by recycling the image Saar attempts to reclaim it as her own and to empower it within the African American culture. 

Betye Saar. The Liberation of Aunt Jemima, 1972

Betye Saar's Feminist Artist Statement

Wangechi Mutu

In the United States, our culture is profoundly influenced by our capitalist consumerism. If an image proves to be profitable, it is packaged and sold in all relative forms. Fredrick Jameson, demonstrated in ''Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism,” that as it stands in postmodernism, culture cannot be deconstructed through a critical distance. However, with the development of new technologies and with the new media that corresponds to it, Adrian Piper and artists like Wangechi Mutu have established that by cultivating performances that do not resemble pervious productions in media, they do not allow room for a critical distance.

Ultimately, Jamerson expresses, that though a critical distance may not be possible, cognitive mapping can contribute to the comprehension of the relative political cultural that is not necessary limited to the distraction of capitalism, but an interpretation of  it (Jameson). Basic economics would suggest, as long as there is a demand for ‘blackness’ in our culture there will be a supply of it, and cognitive mapping, relates to finding a representation within an individual’s functioning society. However, the blackness that is demanded in mainstream culture is not one that stands on its own. It is a blackness that is developed through its relation to whiteness. Just as the construction of the female gender is only defined through its relation to maleness.

    
Therefore, as a “marked” woman, Mutu transforms a person into an unidentified figure in her video installation "The End of eating Everything," because in this form the image is not a recognizable product that can be package and repackage to be sold into the corporate system, it is alien. And it is only through this foreign assembly of art can a black, female artist allow herself to perform a “pure blackness”, one that is not tented or diluted by a default sense of whiteness. As a form of cognitive mapping, Mutu  and other artist like her have created a narrative that is can completely their own, actively contradicting the historical markers that have are assigned to them a people and as artist. 

Wangechi Mutu - The End of eating Everything - Still, 2013.

Works Cited:

Chadwick, Whitney. Women, Art, and Society. Fourth ed. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2007. Print.

Concannon, Kevin. "Yoko Ono's CUT PIECE: From Text to Performance and Back Again by Kevin Concannon." IMAGINE PEACE. N.p., Sept. 2008. Web.

Guerrilla Girls. The Guerrilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art. New York: Penguin, 1998. Print.

Jameson, Fredric. "Postmodernism Or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism."Postmodernism Or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. N.p., n.d. Web. 

Sackler, Elizabeth A. Center for Feminist Art: Feminist Art Base: Betye Saar." Brooklyn Museum:. N.p., n.d. Web.

Yoko Ono - Artists - Online Gallery of Japanese Contemporary Art Azito." Azito. N.p., n.d. Web.