Description
Book SynopsisThe texts gathered in this volume embrace women artists-only exhibitions, festivals, collective art projects, groups and associations, organised in the long 1970s in Europe (1968-1984). These all-women art initiatives are closely related to developments within the political and politicized women’s movement in Europe and America but what emerges is the varied and plural manner of their engagements with feminism(s) alongside their creation of ‘heterotopias’ in relation to specific sites/ politics/ collaborative art practices. This book presents examples from Italy, Spain, UK, Portugal, Austria, Poland, Denmark, Germany (East and West), The Netherlands, France and Sweden. While each chapter is largely devoted to one country, the authors point to how the local and specific political situation in which these initiatives emerged is linked to global tendencies as well as inter-European exchanges. Each chapter of this book thus assesses the impact of travelling views of feminism, by considering connections made between women artists (often when travelling abroad) or their knowledge of art practices from abroad. Distinct and highly varied attitudes towards political activism (from strong engagement to a clearly pronounced distance and even hostility) are shown in each essay and, what is more, they are shown as based on radically different premises about feminism, politics and art. Contributors: Fabienne Dumont, Annika Öhrner, Katy Deepwell, Elke Krasny, Nina Hoechtl, Julia Wieger, Monika Kaiser, Kathleen Wentrack, Katia Almerini, Márcia Oliveira, Agata Jakubowska, and Susanne Altmann.
Trade Review'One can only hope that this book will give rise to new publications on the same subject, which take Europe into account as a space for exchange and thought, as well as other, more peripheral, geographical areas.' (Translated from French)
Phoebe Clarke,
Critique d’art'All-women art spaces in Europe in the long 1970s is an ambitious and invaluable contribution to the fields of art history and gender studies that acknowledges the diverse practices of women artists and enriches our understanding of this transformative period in the history of art and feminism.'
Ksenia Nouril,
Women’s Art JournalReviews'The volume is characterized by its wealth of information [...] It is a knowledgeable and multifaceted contribution to the history of the women-specific and feminist art movement of the 1970s in a comparative and global perspective, and continues into the following decades.' (Translated from German.)
Edith Futscher,
FrauenKunstWissenschaft Table of ContentsAcknowledgements vii
Introduction 1Katy Deepwell and Agata Jakubowska1 Women Artists’ Collectives in France: A Multiplicity of Positionsin a Turbulent Context 19Fabienne Dumont2 Making Space for Feminism. All-Women Art Exhibitions inSweden in the 1970s 47Annika Öhrner3 Feminist Collaborative Projects in the UK in the 1970s 71Katy Deepwell4 ‘For Us, Art is Work’: In♀Akt – International ActionCommunity of Women Artists 96Elke Krasny5 The VBKÖ’s Archive as a Site of Political Confrontation, or HowCan You Sing Out of Tune? 119Nina Hoechtl and Julia Wieger6 The International Exhibition Kvindeudstillingen XX påCharlottenborg in Copenhagen and the Idea of Feminist Art Space 144Monika Kaiser7 Heterotopian Spaces of Feminist Art Practice: The Schulefür kreativen Feminismus and the Stichting Vrouwen in deBeeldende Kunst 167Kathleen Wentrack8 Women’s Art Spaces: Two Mediterranean Case Studies 189Katia Almerini9 Portuguese Women Artists at the National Society of Fine Arts:Why Was This Not a Feminist Exhibition? 209Márcia Oliveira10 No Groups but Friendship. All-Women Initiatives in Poland atthe Turn of the 1980s 229Agata Jakubowska11 ‘And – I have not taken him’. The Erfurt Women Artists’ Group 248Susanne Altmann
Notes on Contributors 269Index 273
