Feminist Art free essay sample

The subject of Feminist art has been debated for many years. Female artiste worked anonymously in a society, obsessed with male dominance for a long time, examples of women artistes before 19th cent are rare. They encountered a clash between their roles as Mothers, householders, workers etc in the society where males imposed patriarchal social systems and hence restricting a female’s artistic (along with her political, social) expression. significant in the dominant cultures patriarchal heritage is the preponderance of art made by males, and for male audiences, sometimes against females. Men maintained a system which excluded women from training as artists, or even selling their works. These events took a turn for good with the advent of feminism in the 1960s. At this time the United States experienced social upheaval coming with the Civil Rights Movement, economic prosperity, and reforms in the Catholic Church. Many other countries experienced social unrest of various kinds during this period. We will write a custom essay sample on Feminist Art or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page women were now educated, independent and sought a more positive role in the society. Consequently feminist art arose from the concerns of artists of one gender, begging the elemental question, what makes male art different from female art. Lucy R. Lippard in her feminist art essay raises a similar question Is there an art unique to women? , Lippard finds herself convinced that some characteristic features are necessarily feminist and hence inaccessible to men. Her social experience, her attitude towards her society would vary from that of a man’s, especially since her (a woman’s) experience of being a woman is naturally unique. ore often than not feminist art have been about womens power in arenas of which sexuality (reproductive acts and roles) is an important part. According to Lippard With more mature understanding of their influence of consciousness raising experience, female art have moved from a neutralized to an overt contact with focus on her sexual experience. But does it stop there? Is female art just a reproduction of Female sexuality? The de finition of feminist art seems limited due to works of art by female artiste laden with sexual innuendos. Therefore how do we define a feminist art? Art by women is not necessarily feminist, then what amounts to a distinction between female and male art. The discipline of gender studies could provide an opportunity to understand feminity with its contemporary sensibilities and juxtaposing it with its traditional connotations. The contemporary meaning of feminine can be appreciated , both in the way female body is celebrated in art and in the way it is portrayed by woman artistes. Lippard explains with an example from Indian art. †¦ In the visual arts of ancient India, the female body is depicted according to a very constant ideal of beauty. This same ideal is reflected also by Epics and classical poetry, through metaphors and similes. The womans body evokes sensuousness, fertility and auspiciousness; and it is often connected with vegetation and natural phenomena, as shown by literature, iconography and cult. Beauty in ancient Indian art is associated with fertility and auspiciousness. The feminine in ancient Indian art in the depiction of the female body according to a very constant ideal of beauty†¦ Female body is signified as a product of social structures of sexual differences and determines both what and how a women is painted. They are the products, sense, of social mobility and visibility in the social relations of seeing and being seen in a particular way, with respect to its cultural reference. Feminism is ideas related to a female’s most intimate experience, breaking away from years of oppressive social conditions. The properties found in women’s art to be expression of the social roles they occupy, putting forward their new social independence through artistic expression though often presupposing what is truly feminine, and hence they avoided the obvious, lest they fell into a line of stereotypes. But today artistes reject this approach and are moving back to the origin of womanhood or femininity, for to talk of one is to talk of another. With many other definitions entailing Feminist art, woman works of art have subjects dealing with their status in society, social; economical, political aspects. The ideology of feminism underlies heavily as a canvas for feminist art, and postmodern theories of the 20th cent views art as breaking the path for a new social order for femininity, which largely focuses on issues regarding nature and status of being an individual, subjectivity, the body etc. the philosophy of feminism moves beyond expression and art to the whole social political world order. The issues concerning the feminine world over, is met where art and traditions rise above ethnic hierarchies to convey common messages of womanhood.