Picture a square with a triangle in it. The triangle is so large
that its tips touch the square on every side (except one, where the tip
comes close). That is the aerial view of the Elizabeth A. Sackler
Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum, where one giant
sculpture featuring dozens of vulvas—The Dinner Party by
Judy Chicago—hogs the space. All the other artworks by all the
other artists in the Sackler Center are pushed to the physical margins,
out into cramped galleries between the triangle’s edges and the
square’s border. The Dinner Party at the Sackler Center, there
since the center opened in 2007, is the kind of spatially and
ideologically overweening monument that, if it were shaped differently,
would have to be called priapistic. Sackler Center’s concentric-style
design by Polshek Partnership Architects, with its vaginal open center
inside the triangle, is meant to invert the typically male-centric
power logic of the monument. Yet the longer this piece dominates this
space, it’s just as easy to see the inversion becoming a mirror. It’s
like the old saying: The opposite of patriarchy is not matriarchy.
Here, the one woman just steals the real estate from the many.
This critique of the architecture of the Sackler Center is a fairly
obvious one, and I’m sure I’m not the first to make it. Since The
Dinner Party first appeared in San Francisco in 1979, a similar
critique has been applied to it, too—that its elevation of
women’s importance in the world is mooted by its reduction of women to
certain, vaginal forms, and where’s the gender-volution in that? I’m
not willing to go that far; The Dinner Party was a fearlessly
proud homage to women’s bodies and occupies a key role in the history
of feminist art. But the only American center for feminist art in a
major general-interest museum demands a more flexible floor plan.
Something else convinced me that this monument is becoming a
monster: a conversation last month at the Sackler Center with 24 art
writers from around the world. Benefactor and namesake Elizabeth
Sackler compared The Dinner Party to the Mona
Lisa—this is supposed to be a good thing?—and boasted
that a third of all the visitors to the Brooklyn Museum say they’ve
come strictly for The Dinner Party. Maybe those visitors are
also noticing the artists in the shadows—Patricia Cronin’s
watercolor archive of the lost works of 19th-century sculptor Harriet
Hosmer, shoved onto a small wall, or the handful of youngish artists in
Reflections on the Electric Mirror: New Feminist Video—but
The Dinner Party is the face of feminist art at the Sackler. A
30-year-old vulva is the face of feminist art.
Kriston Capps, a writer based in Washington, D.C., asked Sackler and
center curator Catherine J. Morris, our speakers, what it meant to
center on a fixed monument in such an evolving field as feminist art.
They dodged the question. When I followed up, Sackler immediately
snapped: “Would you rather it not be here?” Critique—the
lifeblood of feminist thought: bitching, pun intended—was not
welcome. If I was not there to worship the monument, I could kindly
shut the fuck up. Neither Sackler nor Morris responded substantively to
the question. They did not describe any public or private programs or
conversations they’ve had, or are thinking about having, about the
issues involved in the display that Morris aptly described as “the
center of the center.”
Also: Leanne Haase Goebel, a writer from Colorado, asked Sackler and
Morris to define feminism, since the writers in the room had come from
such different backgrounds: Muslim, Judeo-Christian, atheist, Hindu,
Texan. (This sea of productive dissimilarity was the lineup of the
NEA’s International Arts Journalism Institute in the Visual Arts.)
Sackler and Morris appeared unprepared for the question. One more
time: Sackler and Morris appeared unprepared for the question.
They stammered for a few seconds and left no clear impression of how
they define feminism. They refused to take up the mantle they were
already wearing. They also seemed to think this was not a problem.
Who is going to articulate the meaning of feminism when feminist
leaders can’t, won’t, or don’t? Twenty-four writers from around the
world were listening.
Defining feminism is not rocket science, and it’s not only feasible
but imperative. The best definition I know—let’s just learn it
already—comes courtesy of Peggy Phelan, reiterated by Cornelia
Butler in the catalog to the exhibition WACK!: Feminism is the
awareness that gender is one of the fundamental ways the world is
organized, and that this organization has generally favored men over
women. If you believe these two things, you’re a feminist.
Welcome. You have plenty of company, especially in today’s art
world, and now we can finally leave behind the endlessly distracting
debate and begin to talk about issues that really need
attention—like whether The Dinner Party is becoming a
monster. The “feminist revival” (yes, that makes me shudder, too) tent
is still up and running since the main events two years ago (the
opening of the Sackler Center and the shows WACK! and Global
Feminisms). In Los Angeles this summer, Honor Fraser gallery is
showing Bitch Is the New Black; in New York at Cheim & Read,
it’s The Female Gaze: Women Look at Women. (Granted, these are
summer shows, not on view when the most attention is paid.)
In Seattle this month we have the underwhelming group show
Curious Silence at SOIL, and now at Greg Kucera Gallery comes
Women Are Beautiful, a series of photographs of the ways that
women construct themselves in public—and how these women look
back at Seattle photographer Alice Wheeler. Wheeler titled her
exhibition after ’60s photographer Garry Winogrand’s series of women on
the streets, which was largely discredited, unlike Winogrand’s
photographs of less gendered subjects, as frivolous erotic gawking.
Wheeler, whose bright, flashy work also has been underestimated, values
Winogrand’s Women Are Beautiful as a document of the emergence
of visible female sexuality on American streets; her update is a
celebration on what women today can get away with in public—but
it also has some very dark corners. Violence is never entirely out of
view in Wheeler’s pictures, which are also like feminism and feminist
art: There’s much more going on there than first meets the eye.
Screw the definition of feminism, give me a concise (50 words or less) and all encompassing definition of art. I’ll make it easy, limit your definition to “visual” art.
In any case, I’m all for vaginas; I spent the first nine months of my existence in one and must confess that after my next fifteen years out of this holy of holies I’ve spent the rest of my life trying to get back in.
Also, Ms. Graves, please cease your obsessive huckstering of Alice Wheeler, it’s becoming tedious.
Thank You! Yes, this should be said! When will women present ourselves as something other than vaginas! I find it ironic that when Georgia O’keefe presented her work, the critics only saw vaginas despite O’keefe’s protests. The feminist answer has been to overload their work with vaginas. Isn’t the point of demanding equal respect saying “Hey! I more than just a vagina!”
@3. Reminds me of the surrealist painting by Mme. Max Ernst, Luise Straus (or was it by Annie Sprinkle), titled “Ceci n’est pas une vagin.”
More than first meets the eye, indeed. Is that picture actually Eugene Mirman in drag?
Oi,oi what the F?
I mean,please FreudianShrimp is just a “shrimp” ain’t it? Yo,we are not quite sure of FreudianS’s gender right,the fact that the “shrimp” spend fifteen years or whatevermoons trying to get back into the vagina,doesn’t quite explain its gender right?
But what the F is reserved for the “shrimp”s lame response to Jen Graves’critique of what is the what what at Sackler’s Museum of Feminism Art.
Well,I happened to be there on the said day;one of the said “International Writers” oi,Miss Graves,hacks will just do,lol? It’s not quite as negative as it’s made to be.
So among the hacks and a few classy curators,some from Jakarta,Bogota,and Cairo, this African young man who though he’d heard it all about feminism and feminist art,albeit from his beloved but somewhat feminist[or anti feminists?] theorists like Camilla Paglia and Kate Millet,and the younger sussier generations…ah,I sat,half raising my hand,half thinkking:this is such a provincial debate.
“Should I be participating at an art debate revolving around the vulva? Just the vulva?”so I never asked the question.
And Miss Graves,is not answering it or even attempting to, sadly:how “come” especially the “come”is there no African vulva there on the Dinner Table?
Why are African heroines -well Indians,Chinese,Maori,etc– heroines not depicted there, and if it was meant to be American,well yeah,why is there only one AfricanAmerican and to my recall no native Indian American invited on that Dinner Table?
Could it be that the artist Judy Chicago -cute name,1950s Noir-ish moll character,known for her fast gun and giving men that kick in the what-what, they so deserve.
Could it it be she knew that women of color elsewhere in the US and overseas had more pressing and complex ways to engage with and in “their” feminism struggles?
What the F?
Let’s re-open the whole debate on Feminist art,perhaps Ms. Sackler[Mrs?]should call an international symposium on this, one which she wouldn’t have to speak,just as a courtesy to others who have not had the opportunity of hosting the Dinner Parties in their countyries and galleries.
What do say,Brooklyn Museum?Critic?
-B.Madondo
@#1
“Art is the visual representation of an idea, with the intent of communicating that idea to an audience, with all variations and exclusions therein.”
Criticism and ridicule, commence…
@6:
One should never have to explain one’s gender, so I don’t. A shrimp must maintain its mystery.
I am deeply offended by your “FreudianShrimp is just a ‘shrimp’ ain’t it?” It smacks of bigoted “Those people.” stereotyping. Are you a speciesist?
@7:
No criticism or ridicule, but I do have a question: how does “Art” differ from illustration? It seems to me that your definition suits the later more than the former.
@8:
Well, you wanted “all-encompassing”, so my definition would include
Good Art
Bad Art
Commercial Art
Non-Commercial Art
Art that I like
Art that I don’t like
Meaningful, substantive Art
Crass, Exploitative Art
Continue ad nauseam…
Illustration would be included in that because I don’t have any qualitative terms in my definition. People can make qualitative judgments about Art/Not Art all they want, but I would not consider those judgments “definitive.” It’s too subjective and personal.
@8 perhaps art is the visual representation of the abstract with the intent of communicating an idea?
Just an idea (not quite complete)
@9 I think they meant “illustration” as in a verbal illustration, not as in a drawing, but I could be wrong, that is just how I read it.
How I read it is that FreudianShrimp is in high school.
@11
The conversation is focused on “visual art.” See #1.
Hey Freudian Shrimp: On behalf of the vaginas of the world, let me say this: We have no intnention of letting you back in!
“Screw the definition of feminism” you say. Why don’t you pack that mainstream crap up in your dinky little shrimp bag and dump it somewhere else? If you don’t give a fuck about the definition of feminism, then why not simply jack off off in front of a hairless copy of Maxim and leave the rest of us alone. It’s your world go forth and spoog it or whatever. Just get outta here.
Okay, onto better things………………………….
@3 I think you oversimplify things. The feminist answer is not always one thing, as feminists are a diverse group. I won’t claim expertise on Chicago’s Dinner Party, but I think one idea behind women portraying vaginas in art, is the notion that they don’t have to be hidden like dirty, shameful secrets. Making art incorporating vaginal imagery can be a way to elevate its status and it probably looks weird because vaginas are ranked pretty low in our world (Don’t believe me? Then why do douches exist even though the vagina is a self-cleaning organ? Then why all the secrecy around menstruation? Then how about that new phenomenon: vaginal reconstructive surgery for aesthetic reasons?). That’s not to say that women should or shouldn’t represent vaginas; it depends on the artist’s vision. There’s also a lot of phallic imagery in art and architecture (Hello, the Washington Monument and the more blatant, literal Mapplethorpe photos of naked men and their penises). Sometimes female artists use vaginas to call out the fact that women are often perceived almost soley as vaginas. For example, unless I’m missing the point, I think that’s was what the late Hannah Wilke (spelling?) intended when she photographed herself w/ a bunch of tiny kneaded eraser vaginas stuck to her face.
@12. Jen? Jen Graves? Is that you?
“The feminist answer is not always one thing, as feminists are a diverse group.”
Truer words were never written. The lack of any consensus on even basic fundamental concepts within supposed schools of thought never ceases to amaze me. This is especially true of feminism.
But I have another thing I’d like to discuss. Although I would agree with the definition of feminism stated in this article I am forced to wonder why it actually matters which group is favoured by the way gender is organised. Gender roles are oppressive for both men and women, the major difference being that they are both more ingrained and more frequently overlooked when it comes to men. I do accept that men have a few more advantages than women in contemporary society, but I believe the reverse is true in almost as many circumstances and so the extent to which men are favoured is marginal at best. This is all a matter of opinion of course. It comes down to whether you value tangible things like career opportunities over less tangible things like sexual liberation and the freedom to express emotional vulnerability. I would in fact argue than women are more sexually liberated than men in contemporary society, especially when it comes to the fluidity of sexual orientation and the repression of homosexuality. As for emotional vulnerability, it goes without saying that it’s a male taboo, a concept seemingly enforced by as many women as men. It amazes me how uncaring most of the feminists writers I have spoken with are about deconstructing male gender roles, many in fact enforcing very negative gender constraints. So I have a question, am I a misogynist just because I don’t believe that power necessarily translates to freedom, or that the extent to which men are favoured by dominant gender roles is slight as opposed to great, or am I merely not a feminist?
@14. Yes ma’am. Far be it for me to question the self appointed spokesvagina of the world. I enjoyed each and every erroneous assumption you gleaned from my first post. Thanks for reminding me how grim and humorless ideologues can be.
Just to be clear FreudianShrimp, nobody spent the first 9 months of their lives in a vagina. Unless you were using the term ‘vagina’ as synecdoche for the entire female reproductive tract (or the entire woman), your statement is incorrect. It is far more likely that you spent your first 9 months in a uterus, like everyone else.
Hey F-Shrimp: The joke’s not funny because it’s on you. I don’t know, every time I hear the word “spoog” it makes me laugh. I do also realize though, that as a term, it gives me away for the ideologue that I am. You’re just sayin’ I’m humorless because I’m a feminist. That would be the same kind of mainstream crap I was referring to in my previous post.
“Gleaned from [your] post”? Are you kidding me w/ this? There’s nothing there. Glean means to collect something little by little (look it up). Your post was pretty easy to swallow whole (that’s a little vagina humor there). So when you call yourself “shrimp,” I can only assume your referring to your intellect, oh wait……….
I AM THE SPOKESVAGINA! That is so cool! I plan to make a t-shirt. I really can’t think of a higher compliment.
THE SPOKESVAGINA HAS SPOKEN! NOW EAT ME!
@16 Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post. I’ll get back to you later if I feel like it. I gotta work out.
Whoops, speaking of intellect, I meant to write “you’re” in my post. I’ll probably pay for that, but whatever.