Linda Nochlin asked in her now famous essay of the same title, “Why have there been no great women artists?” Certainly there are many fewer women artists included in what is commonly considered the canon of art than men, perhaps even none before feminists sought to rediscover underappreciated artists from the past. One possible explanation for this is Simone de Beauvoir’s, that the art history canon was created by men, and skewed to ignore women otherwise deserving the same praise. Linda Nochlin disagrees with this idea in her essay, saying
‘The fact of the matter is that there have been no supremely great women artists, as far as we know, although there have been many interesting and very good ones who remain insufficiently investigated or appreciated; …That this should be the case is regrettable, but no amount of manipulating the historical or critical evidence will alter the situation, nor will accusations of male-chauvinist distortion of history. There are no women equivalents for Michelangelo or Rembrandt, Delacroix or Cézanne, Picasso or Matisse, or even, in very recent times, for de Kooning or Warhol’.[2]
This seems to be quite a concrete putdown to the argument of overlooked women, but it is not necessarily 100% convincing. She does for example say ‘there have been no supremely great women artists, as far as we know’, which seems to suggest that she would be open to the possibility that there are such artists out there, simply unrecognised in their talent. Also, it may be her opinion that no woman has matched those great artists, but others may differ on this, arguing that some women do compare, the most commonly used example being Artemisia Gentileschi.
If Artemisia has been ignored by writers touched by a masculine bias, she has been warmly embraced by those fortified with a feminist sensibility. She has consistently been a centrepiece in the books on women artists that began to appear in the early 1970s, notably those of Ann Harris and Linda Nochlin, Eleanor Tufts, Elsa Fine, and Germaine Greer. Greer who heralded Gentileschi as “The Magnificent Exception,” reflected the common feminist wisdom that she was, of all the women artists working before the late nineteenth century, the most outstanding, the giant.[3]
Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653) was an Italian Baroque painter, influenced by Caravaggio; she was the first female painter to become a member of the Accademia di Arte del Disegno in Florence. She was also one of the first female artists to paint historical and religious paintings, at a time when such heroic themes were considered beyond a woman's reach.[4] At a time where it was nearly impossible for a woman to become an artist, Gentileschi achieved much greatness, but it wasn’t purely on talent that got her that far. Her father, Orazio Gentileschi, was an artist, and encouraged all his children to become artists. It was Artemisia who displayed more talent than her brothers, and after being rejected from one arts school, her father paid for her to have private tuition. Without this family background supporting her, it is very likely that she would not have been able to become an artist at all, instead she probably would have had some sort of domestic role without the freedom to pursue other interests, as was the norm for women up until even the mid-20th century. Indeed, this constriction or limitation happened to many other female artists of the past, who had to give up their profession after they were married. Judith Leyster and Caterina van Hemessen are two examples of women artists who are believed to have given up art as a career after marrying.
In the 1980s a group of feminists known as the Guerrilla Girls began protesting virulently about the lack of inclusion of women artists in museums, exhibitions and the canon of great artists. They would make posters pointing out the extreme discrepancies in balance, often including a picture of a woman with a gorilla mask, and often using humour to make their point. One poster puts out the statistic that while less than 5% of the artists in the Metropolitan Museum in New York are women, 85% of the nudes are. It satirically asks the question, “Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?” They believe their posters have had an impact, citing Mary Boone as a particular example of someone who now represents a lot more women after the Guerrilla Girls targeted her.[5] The Guerrilla Girls also specifically defend Georgia O’Keeffe, an artist famous for her sexualised paintings of flowers. They complain that male art critics denounce her work for its sexualised content, but do nothing similar for men who do very sexual works. The Guerrilla Girls heavily disagree with Linda Nochlin, and take the approach of revisionist history, or “Add Women and Stir”. Their goal is to include more lost or forgotten women into the canon of great artists, Artemisia Gentileschi being their greatest champion.
It is possible that there may have been great women artists, but these have been lost or forgotten, partly because there were very few women practising art at all, due to a social structure that made it very difficult for women to get the required training, or to maintain a career. With very few women able to be artists, there would also be many less women who achieved greatness out of this. Even in the 1950s it was very difficult for women to attend art school. For example Paula Rego who attended the Slade School of Art in London, told art historian Marco Livingstone in a recent interview about how the only reason women were accepted into the school was in order for them to marry the male students, and they would then be expected to give up their art. Paula Rego did indeed marry a fellow student, but she did not give up her art. Another quote from Simone de Beauvoir explains this situation. “One is not born a genius, one becomes a genius; and the feminine situation has up to the present rendered this becoming practically impossible.”[6]
Historically it was incredibly difficult for women to get training as artists or to be taken more seriously, and they were often dismissed unfairly.
‘Women were not allowed to study nudes in the academies from the Renaissance through the nineteenth century to learn life drawing, and this blocked their participation in the all-important genre of history painting. Northern European flower paintings that were previously admired began to seem “delicate”, “feminine”, and “weak” by contrast to large bold canvases on classical themes.’[7]
This held back women a lot, as it is impossible ‘to imagine that greatness will be manifested no matter what the surrounding circumstances. Artists need training and materials.’[8] It is only the ones with very fortunate circumstances that managed to break free of either their stereotype or the constrictions that society imposed and become successful. Even then, they often still suffered much persecution, such as Artemisia Gentileschi who was raped by her tutor, and didn’t seek punishment for him until he declared that he would not marry her. For the trial Artemisia was tortured by thumbscrews to prove her story, her rapist was eventually given a one year sentence that he did not serve.
There is also the National Museum of Women in the Arts, opened in 1987 in Washington D.C. It is the only museum solely dedicated to celebrating women’s achievements in the visual, performing and literary arts.[9] It houses a collection of over 4,000 works by nearly 1,000 artists, including those by Louise Bourgeois, Mary Cassatt, Frida Kahlo and Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, all great artists, comparable to their contemporaries. Mary Cassatt was an American who lived in France, befriending, working with and exhibiting with the Impressionists, who had another female artist working with them, Berthe Morisot. Morisot was previously thought to have been a follower of Édouard Manet, however now new evidence suggests that they both taught each other things. Elements of Morisot’s work can be seen to be incorporated into Manet’s, and it was Morisot who introduced Manet to plein air painting, and introduced him to the other impressionists. This could be seen as an example of previous art historians attempting to lessen the importance of a woman artist by implying that she was merely a pupil of Manet, whereas now we know this not to be the case.
There could be many other women artists we are incorrectly led to believe are less important or independent than they really were. In the 18th and 19th centuries some art dealers even went as far as to alter signatures, reassigning work from women artists to male ones, such as Judith Leyster’s signature being altered to Frans Hals, presumably motivated by the desire to increase the value attached to such paintings. Some of these have now been uncovered and reattributed correctly, but it is impossible to say how many more are incorrectly attributed to men.
We have to reject the simple notions that women’s art has been ignored, neglected or mistreated by art history, and seriously question the belief that women need to struggle to gain entry into and recognition from the existing male-dominated field of art. Far from failing to measure up to supposedly ‘objective’ standards of achievement in art, so unproblematically attained by men by virtue of their sex, we discover that art by women has been made to play a major role in the creation and reproduction of those very standards.[10]
There are other artists such as Alice Neel, who were not appreciated for quite a long time of their career, and who only achieved success at the end of the 1960s as a result of the Women’s Movement. Previously her work was considered simply not the “in thing”, but after receiving much attention as a great woman artist by feminists her stature rose hugely, leaving her regarded as one of the best women artists of the 20th century.
In more recent times things have started to improve much more greatly. Women have won the Turner Prize in 1993, 2006 and in 1997, when there was an all-women shortlist. Tracey Emin was nominated in 1999, and though she did not win she garnered a lot of media attention for her work My Bed, and she is now arguably one of the most famous artists in the world.
In conclusion, there have been great women artists down the centuries. Many less than men, up until the mid-20th century really, because of social expectations of women’s roles in family life, and the difficulty there was for women to get training or win patronage. The few women that did manage to achieve greatness can be compared with their contemporaries who have been included in the canon, in contrast to what Linda Nochlin thinks. In the latter half of the 20th century many more women rose to prominence, and now are some of the most famous worldwide, and achieve much critical and commercial success. It seems the playing field has been levelled, and now women are able to compete on a much more even ground.
Bibliography
Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans., Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevalier Vintage Books USA, 2009
Linda Nochlin, Women, Art, and Power and Other Essays, Harper & Row, 1988
Mary D. Garrard, Artemisia Gentileschi, Princeton University Press, 1989
Rozsika Parker and Griselda Pollock, Old Mistresses, Pandora, 1981
Griselda Pollock, Differencing the Canon, Routledge, 1999
Cynthia Freeland, Gender, Genius and Guerrilla Girls, Oxford University Press, 2001
[1] Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans., Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevalier Vintage Books USA, 2009
[2] Linda Nochlin, Women, Art, and Power and Other Essays, Harper & Row, 1988, p. 149-150
[3] Mary D. Garrard, Artemisia Gentileschi, Princeton University Press, 1989, p. 5
[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemisia_Gentileschi 14th December 2010
[5] Cynthia Freeland, Gender, Genius and Guerrilla Girls, Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 85
[6] Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans., Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevalier Vintage Books USA, 2009
[7] Cynthia Freeland, Gender, Genius and Guerrilla Girls, Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 93
[8] Cynthia Freeland, Gender, Genius and Guerrilla Girls, Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 86
[9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Museum_of_Women_in_the_Arts 15th December 2010
[10] Rozsika Parker and Griselda Pollock, Old Mistresses, Pandora, 1981, p. 169
Final Mark: 62%, 2-1
Final Mark: 62%, 2-1
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