Women's Art Movement

movement from 1974 Australia

The Women's Art Movement (WAM) was an Australian feminist art movement, founded in Sydney and Melbourne in 1974 and in Adelaide in 1976 as the Women's Art Group. Taking its cue from international feminist practice - and galvanized by the 1975 visit of US art critic Lucy Lippard, who spoke to women-only groups about slide registers of women artists' work - the city branches ran as collectives. They staged consciousness-raising studio and exhibition workshops that analysed the political implications of personal experience in visual art, and built archives to counter women's invisibility in galleries. Melbourne's 1974 exhibition A Room of One's Own: Three Women Artists helped launch that branch, and Adelaide's 1977 Women's Show gathered over 350 works. By the mid-1980s WAM was highly respected across Australia and worldwide.

کاپریس در بنفش و طلایی؛ کیمونو و پارتیشن ، نام اثری است از جیمز مک‌نیل ویسلر ، نقاش برجستهٔ آمریکایی در سبک واقع‌گرایی که بر روی چوب خلق شد.
کاپریس در بنفش و طلایی؛ کیمونو و پارتیشن ، نام اثری است از جیمز مک‌نیل ویسلر ، نقاش برجستهٔ آمریکایی در سبک واقع‌گرایی که بر روی چوب خلق شد.Public domain (credit: James McNeill Whistler) · source

Defining characteristics

  • Women-only collectives run without formal hierarchy
  • Consciousness-raising workshops treating personal experience as political subject matter
  • Slide registers and archives documenting women artists' work for galleries and study
  • Exhibitions and events spanning visual art, photography, film, performance, and text
  • Institutional critique aimed at sexism in the art world

Key figures

  • Lucy Lippard (b. 1937) — US feminist art critic whose 1975 Australian visit galvanized the movement
  • Linda Nochlin (1931-2017) — Art historian whose essay 'Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?' inspired the Sydney branch
  • Ann Newmarch — Co-founder of the Adelaide Women's Art Group (1976)
  • Janine Burke — Co-curator of A Room of One's Own and curator of Australian Women Artists 1840-1940
  • Marie McMahon — Founding member of the Sydney Women's Art Movement

Example works

  • A Room of One's Own: Three Women Artists — Co-curated by Kiffy Rubbo, Lynne Cook, and Janine Burke (1974)
  • Australian Women Artists 1840-1940 — Janine Burke (1975)
  • The Women's Show — Julie Ewington (curator), Experimental Art Foundation (1977)

Sources

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