ESSAYS AND ESSAYISTS
Half the Sky: Intersections in Social Practice Art Cultural Exchange and Exhibition China
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Essayists were asked to consider the following: Are there any remaining and defining boundaries to women's art practices and how does this relate to a definition of art as a whole? Are there still niches of art practice particular to a woman's perspective? What are the roots of Social Practice Art in relation to women's art history? How are Social Practice Art academic programs shaping the work of women artists? This art and cultural exchange project with its opportunities for building community and common understanding, collaborative art creation, and dialogue is, in itself, a piece of Social Practice Art. How are such works critiqued? How do we put Social Practice works in context with other art forms? Which women artists in the United States are creating excitement in today’s art marketplace and/or influencing art practices? Essayists were also invited to submit essays about their collaborations with community organizations and other aritsts as well as their relationship to aesthetics, documentation practices and social interventions. Essay juror and art historian Terri Weissman, whose own scholarship focuses on the visual culture of protest movements,selected four essays that offer vivid accounts of deploying art to address with environmental concerns, violence against women, control of women’s voices and gender equity. Special thanks to Mido Lee for her skillful translations to make the written thoughts of the essayists accessible to all participants. Our juror, Terri Weissman, chose the following:
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Our Juror
Terri Weissman Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign Weissman teaches Modern and Contemporary Art, and the History of Photography. She is the author of The Realisms of Berenice Abbott: Documentary Photography and Political Action (2011), and the co-curator (with Sharon Corwin and Jessica May) of the exhibition American Modern: Abbott, Evans and Bourke-White. Her articles “Detroit's Edible Gardens: Art and Agriculture in a Post-Environmental World,” published inThird Text (Online), and "Freedom's Just Another Word," in the collection Contemporary Art: 1989 to the Present, are part of her current project on the visual culture of protest movements. http://illinois.edu/ds/search?search_&search=tweissma |
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Betsy Damon
"Betsy Damon: Knowing Water" Brooklyn, New York Betsy Damon's journey to knowing water has taken her to the deserts of Utah, all the way to the Himalayan Mountains, into the polluted rivers of Chengdu and through the storm water pipes of Pittsburgh. For her, to follow water was to discover ancient tradition, contemporary blunders, the greed of privatization, and the generosity and strength of close-knit communities. Link to Essay |
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Sandra Mueller
" 'Pearls of Wisdom' — A Personal Account" Malibu, California A poignant account of a two-year community engagement project between artist Kim Abeles, nonprofit A Window Between Worlds and 800 survivors of domestic violence that the author chaired. Based on the powerful metaphor of pearls as treasures that form inside an oyster in response to a hurtful irritant, the author shares the challenges of producing this multi-faceted collaboration that produced a stunning exhibition, four-color catalogue with essays by Suzanne Lacy, Barbara T. Smith, compelling programs and an online curriculum and blog. Link to Essay |
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Natalie Phillips
"To Belie the Dragonflly: Elisabeth Subrin's Rhetoric of Silence" Muncie, Indiana This essay is an examination of the films and videos of Elisabeth Subrin, an artist whose work poignantly explores the widespread silencing of women’s voices in our culture and their desperate struggle to be heard. Subrin’s biographical and auto-biographical films help to defiantly give women back their voices and act as a powerful protest against the suppression of women’s voices by all manner of patriarchal authority. Link to Essay |
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Sherry Saunders
"Celebrity and Gender in Graphic Design" Celebrity and Gender in Graphic Design discusses how although women make up more than half the graphic design profession, men represent the majority of celebrity designers; women become the basic task workers, holding up “half the sky” in the graphic design world, yet most do not receive the same recognition as their male counterparts. Perceptions of gender in graphic design as well as the creation of a canon in graphic design are both explored as a potential problems in perpetuating this trend. Link to Essay |
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