So What Happened?

I found this while searching YouTube and the themes highlighted in the clip were fairly discouraging. This is a little trailer for the movie Who Does She Think She Is? As you can tell after watching it, the film attempts to expose the continued disassociation of women from art institutions and creative acclaim. Unfortunately, I can't comment on how the filmmaker supports her claims until my Netflix comes; however, even the film's trailer addresses the continued struggles of female artists through statistics and brief interviews.

Within seconds into the clip, the viewer is compelled to question the true impact of the modern feminist art we have discussed in class. Why is it that random, seemingly educated, male New Yorkers can't think of any female artists? Why is it that the School of Visual Arts (in New York) has an 80% female student body, but the art world is predominantly 80% men?? While the individual spouting these statistics could be completely inaccurate and misinformed, there is clearly a gender inequality within the art world today. I found these questions particularly relevant given our class discussion last Thursday. The lack of female participation within the resurgence of painting during the 1980's was troubling. Even the acclaimed art critic Barbara Rose was inclined to praise the return and re-interpretation of modern painting in her article American Painting: The Eighties and able to overlook gender inequalities in her positive critique. Was she in total denial or did she care more about her own career than the broader issues of women in art?? Personally, I don't really care if Barbara Jones was a career driven maniac, but it makes me wonder if all women in art are doing the same thing. Do women have to abandon issues of gender to get ahead?

The other topic I struggled with was "the ghettoized issues of motherhood and childbirth." This film is clearly trying to associate the role of motherhood with the lack of women in the arts. Honestly, I'll need to see the film to address this issue. Yes, its tough to be a mother and maintain a career, but women do it all the time.  Georgia O'Keefe didn't have kids, but its now almost a century later. The hindrance of motherhood is shared by all, not just the female artists. If the dual role of artist and mother is met with hostility, there must be other underlying factors for the current gender discrepancies in art.

Are all women in the arts adopting the Barbara Rose-ian method? Do women have to deny gender inequalities and their role as mothers to succeed artistically?