“Teachers.” /Photo: press.
Numerous museums and cultural spaces around the world are preparing to close their 2023 calendar with exhibitions dedicated to the “power of women”through scripts and curatorships that focus on their invisible role throughout history, and in correlation with the growing feminist activism, which demands parity and equality in the representations of international artistic collections. Initiatives to combat the historical inequality of gender representation in the art world are increasingly recurrent and widespread, historically under the patriarchal gaze: not in vain has the feminist term “herstory” grown strongly in recent times to define the “history” from the point of view of the woman (“her”), and which plays with the English word history (his-story, his story).
The samples “What if Women Ruled the World?”, at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Athens (EM?T); “Ahead of their time: pioneering women from the Renaissance to the 20th century”, at the New York gallery R+V; “Hairstyles, women and power in the Renaissance”, in the Italian museum Gallerie d’Italia Vicenzaand the recently inaugurated “Teachers” at the Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum in Madrid and “Women dressing women” at the MET They give an account of this phenomenon that seeks to provide a view and understanding of the world different from that established for centuries.
Faustina’s head from “Maestras”. /Photo: press.
“At a time when we are witnessing in Europe and beyond the rise of male-driven authoritarian regimes, leading to social and political polarization and increased geopolitical tensions, it seems an opportune moment for this reflection,” he says in a statement. statement from the Greek museum, where the exhibition “What if women ruled the world?” has just opened.
It is a cycle of several episodes that opened on December 14 and includes a new hanging from the museum’s permanent collection under the title “Women, together”, curated by Katerina Gregos and Eleni Koukou, in addition to multiple individual exhibitions , temporary, only for female artists, until October 2024.
The new rearrangement of the collection, which exclusively highlights the work of women artists in its collection, seeks to “address an important problem that all museums face today: the underrepresentation of women and the urgency regarding gender equality (one of the main shared concerns underlying all waves of feminism over the years, no matter how different),” said the museum’s artistic director, Katerina Gregos. “Would the world be a better place if women led governance and were primary decision-makers?” is the question that links everything planned this year by the Athenian museum.
Women together. /Photo: press.
“Ahead of their time: pioneering women from the Renaissance to the 20th century” is the title of the exhibition that opened at the beginning of December and will continue until February 10 at the New York gallery Robiliant+Voena (R+V), which brings together portraits, works and porcelain of more than 30 notable women in the artistic, cultural or intellectual of Europe and America over five centuries.
Each of them “stood out in the context of their time, overcoming the obstacles imposed by societies throughout history,” explains curator Virginia Brilliant, adding that the exhibition is “an opportunity for the public to learn more about the considerable challenges that even the most talented and fearless women face in a male-dominated world as they seek to claim their place in the canon of art history.”
Photo: press.
Paintings such as “Judith with the Head of Holofernes” (circa 1622) by the Italian Fede Galizia or “The Penitent Magdalene” by Artemisia Gentileschi give shape to the exhibition that also includes a portrait of the Brontë sisters, famous for their novels – made by his brother Patrick Branwell Brontë – and even a portrait of the Frenchwoman Grace Gassette (1871-1955), who used her artistic training, during the First World War, to design orthopedic devices for wounded soldiers, in the nursing area.
The Metropolitan Museum of New York (MET), one of the most important art collections in the world, will host the temporary exhibition “Women dressing women” until March 3, 2024 (Women dressing women), which explores the creativity and artistic legacy of more than 70 fashion designers who have made women’s clothing.
The exhibition itinerary traces a lineage of creators that goes from the beginning of the 20th century to the present, in a journey that seeks to bring together famous designers but also give space to new voices and forgotten stories, reports from the MET.
Names like Jeanne Lanvin, American manufacturers like Ann Lowe and Isabel Toledo, along with contemporary designs by Rei Kawakubo and Anifa Mvuemba integrate the exemplars of the feminine perspective when designing clothing for women.
Photo: press.
In Madrid, the “Maestras” exhibitionwhich inaugurated the Thyssen-Bornemisza, offers the public a feminist journey through the history of art: a selection of works ranging from the end of the 16th century to the first decades of the 20th century and which are presented as a new canon of Western art.
“They were all famous in their time and today they are once again recognized as teachers, in response to the erasure in art history that they suffered along with other lesser-known creators who broke the mold with works of undoubted excellence,” explains curator Rocío de la Villa. on the group that includes names such as Artemisia Gentileschi, Angelica Kauffmann, Clara Peeters, Rosa Bonheur, Mary Cassatt, Berthe Morisot, Sonia Delaunay or Maruja Mallo.
With its focus on “sound”, as the Spanish museum explained in a statement, the exhibition seeks to show how these artists – in different historical periods – addressed burning issues of their time, took a position and contributed new iconography and alternative views.
Photo: press.
The painting from 1664 “Porcia wounding her thigh”, by Elisabetta Sirani; “Judit and his maid”, by the Italian painter Artemisia Gentileschi; a “Still Life with Flowers, Gilt Silver Cup, Almonds, Nuts, Sweets, Rolls, Wine, and Pewter Jug” (1611), by the Flemish artist Clara Peeters; and “Glass Fruit Bowl with Peaches, Quince and Jasmine” by the Baroque painter Fede Galizia, from the 17th century; These are some of the works that will make up the exhibition that opens until February 4 in the Spanish capital.
Finally, the exhibition called “Faustina’s Braids: Hairstyles, Women and Power in the Renaissance” at the Gallerie d’Italia, in Vicenzatakes as its trigger a curious aspect: the fascinating and complex world of hairstyles in the 15th and 16th centuries.
Through 70 works, including busts – imperial and Renaissance – paintings, sculptures, ancient coins, medals and drawings, the tour explores the artistic possibilities that female hairstyles offered and what relevance they had in Italian society.
Photo: press.
Curated by Howard Burns, Vincenzo Farinella and Mauro Mussolin, the exhibition that will continue until April 7, 2024, takes as its title “one of the most spectacular and famous hairstyles of the time, that of the Roman empress Faustina the Elder, wife of Antonino Pío,” they reported from the museum.
Spread throughout eight rooms of the museum, the exhibition focuses on showing the various hairstyles chosen by women in ancient times, is dedicated to Michelangelo’s interest in the representation of female hair, examining drawings of “divine heads” and brings together a selection of portraits of Renaissance protagonists such as Lucrecia Borgia, Vittoria Colonna and Eleonora da Toledo.
2023-12-19 22:04:33
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