Feminism

Madeleine Newman

Oxford Definition:
‘The advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes’

Tate Glossary: Feminist Art
‘May be defined as art by women artists made consciously in the light of developments in feminist art theory since about 1970’

1st wave feminism - 19th and 20th century

2nd wave feminism - late 20th Century 1960s-1980s

3rd wave feminism - 1980s- today?

Simone de Beauvoir - The Second Sex, 1949
Betty Friedan - The Feminine Mystique, 1963
Germaine Greer - The Female Eunuch, 197-

feminist art history & theory
- feminist analysis suggests that the art system and art history have institutionalised sexism, just as with society
- feminist analysis argues for a total re-evaluation and reinterpretation of art history

Griselda Pollock - Old Mistresses: Women, Art and Ideology, 1981

Challenging traditions of representation and 'The Gaze"
‘Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at' - John Berger - Ways of Seeing, 1972
Who is looking?

Mary Kelly - Post Partum Document, 1973-79.

Challenging Institutions and Ideologies
The Guerrilla Girls
- formed in New York, 1980
- aim to expose discrimination in the art world

Defining feminism today - Tracy Emin, Sarah Lucas etc

Defining 'Post Feminism'
- not dealing with one perspective but many
- represents a shift in feminist theory from 1968 onwards
- pluralistic viewpoint/political position that argues feminism has achieved a deconstruction of patriarchal discourse.
- reaction to 2nd wave feminism.

Conclusions
- feminism is a response to society and culture.
- aims to highlight gender as a social construct
- set of ideas and perspectives about how we understand destabilise dominant ideologies in society and history