Modernism was a cultural movement of painting, sculpture, architecture, and poetry that occurred between the late 19th century and the early 20th century. This movement was characterized by its departure from the conventions of the past and interest in utilizing many new mediums. Different from the previous movements, Modernism was based on a rational and linear view of the world and modernists believed that science and reason were essential structures for mankind. During this period, women artists were using other women’s bodies and even their own as forms of expression. Before this time, women were perceived as weak, subordinate, and their purpose was to only serve men. Men painted women for their own desire and objectified them continuously. However, artists such as Suzanne Valadon and Paula Modersohn Becker were the first to depict the nude female body in their paintings. Their artworks together challenged the past narratives of the female body and created a more profound view which gave them more control over themselves and their lifestyles.
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| Paula Modersohn-Becker, Mother with baby at her breast, and child in landscape, 1905 |
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| Suzanne Valadon, The Two Bathers, 1923 |
Women were beginning to realize that they were powerful enough to subdue the obstacles that were related to a patriarchal society. Women had a chance to become apart of history and create a voice from themselves within “Western art movements, and “isms” appeared, one after another: impression, post-impressionism, fauvism, cubism, futurism, constructivism, dada-ism, surrealism, expressionism, abstract expression, etc. Put them all together and what do we get? Modernism” (Guerilla Girls 59). In movements like Dada-ism, artists such as Hannah Hoch emerged and challenged bourgeois society. Hoch was a German Dada artist and was one of the creators of photomontage. In photomontage, Hoch rearranged images from popular forms of media to express her stance on political and social issues. Hoch worked with her boyfriend at the time, Rauol Hausman, who insisted that her only role in his life was to bear his children and support him. Ultimately, Hoch left him and continued her artwork in a new same-sex relationship with a Dutch poet, Til Brugman.
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| Hannah Hoch, Over the water, 1942 |
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| Frida Kahlo, The Broken Column, 1944 |
Surrealism was a 20th-century movement that focused on illustrating the unconscious mind through dreams. Surrealism was a way in which women depicted themselves abstractly but also depicted their own realities. Frida Kahlo illustrated her reality in major of her art pieces,” the duality of Kahlo’s life--an exterior persona constantly reinvented with costume and ornament, and an interior image nourished on the pain of a body crippled in a trolley accident when she was an adolescent--invests her painting with a haunting complexity and a narrative quality disturbing in its ambiguity” (Chadwick 313).
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| Lee Krasner, Night Creatures, 1965 |
Women artist were willing to break the rules formulated by the men. It was both an empowering and motivating time for women artists who were not taken seriously. Postmodernism occurred after World War II and introduced a direct rejection to the trends followed in modernism. Many women aligned themselves with the Abstract Expressionism movement. It was a movement that was illustrated with lively and colorful palettes which emphasized expressive freedom in art. Lee Krasner, for example, was one of many key figures in the transition to Abstract Expressionism. She recycled scraps from old canvases and reconstructed them into collages and sometimes even destroyed full bodies of work. Married to Jackson Pollock, a major artist in abstract expressionism who was known for drip painting, Krasner struggled to define herself as an abstract artist as she was, “forced to confront the ways her own body was inscribed as “feminine.” Anne Wagner has argued that Krasner’s art during this period was marked by its refusal to produce a self in painting” (Chadwick 320). Krasner wanted to exclude herself from the male-dominated movement and also her identity as Pollock’s wife.
After World War II, issues of sexuality, race, gender, body image, etc arose and women were heavily critiqued. During the 1960s, women artists like Faith Ringgold and Mary Stevens investigated the relationship between racism and patriarchy. Civil Rights was an important matter for African Americans as a resolution to injustice and police brutality was yearned for. The African American reality revolved around the stereotypes and mistreatment brought on by white Americans. Faith Ringgold used art to showcase her thoughts on the social injustices African Americans faced. Her artwork directly confronted issues faced by the black community and established a political statement. Ringgold was, “influenced by the writings of James Baldwin and Amiri Baraka (then LeRoi Jones). In 1966, she participated in the first exhibition of black artists held in Harlem since the 1930s. The following year, Ringgold exhibited Die…” (Chadwick 342).
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| Faith Ringgold, Tar Beach #2, 1990 |
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| Mary Stevens, Big Daddy, Paper Doll, 1968 |
Postmodernism relied heavily on women reconstructing their own image. It marked a period of uprising and the restoration of the female body. The female of this time was radical and had more control over her sexuality. She could represent herself the way she wanted to which was a direct difference from Modernism which restricted women immensely. During the modernism period, men were viewed as geniuses and art was only for the wealthy. Postmodernism ideals allowed women to become independent in their life and in their work. The notions of patriarchy and inequality still exist today but women are still willing to challenge it through their own means whether it is from their art, literature, activism, successes, etc.
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| Faith Ringgold, Die, 1967 |
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Works Cited
Chadwick, Whitney. Women, Art, and Society. Langara College, 2016.
Guerilla Girls. The Guerilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art.
Guerilla Girls. The Guerilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art.
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