female artists

I can't believe it's the end of my guest blog series already. Looking at he theme of art and feminism has raised loads of questions and also given lots of answers. We've explored artists who use hair and those who've experienced domestic violence, the woman who got a vaginal Damien Hirst tattoo, and the countless murdered and attacked females in Juarez, Mexico, who have been immortalized through the exhibition 400 Women. It's powerful stuff...

When I started this guest blog I was overwhelmed with your brilliant suggestions for artists to explore, and I followed up on as many of your tips as possible. Here is a taste of what Bitch readers recommend—I hope you'll discover someone who inspires you!

For me, art isn't just about finding something pretty or intelligent, or wishing I could paint as well as someone else. It's about looking at a piece and knowing that it's taught you something and you feel better for having seen it. You understand the world a little better afterwards, and you can't wait to rave about it to your friends. Here are three lessons I've learned from artists that I'd like to pass on:

In a game of word association, "art" might make people think of paintings, sketches, canvases or a specific artist like Jackson Pollock (paint splatters, oh my) or the Mona Lisa (very tiny, strange smile). Disciplines such as sculpture, ceramics, and taxidermy might not be mentioned, because they're sidelined in favor of the mainstream. Etsy and Deviant Art are full of intense paintings; children bring home scribbles from school that are kept on the wall for years, but there's a weirder and larger side to art.

Together, Andrea Blood and Zoe Sinclair are known as The Girls—an artistic partnership that has revolved around intense tableaux self-portraits, live performances, videos and installations. Along with exhibiting regularly in the UK, they’ve shown at the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art and Milan’s UNO+UNO. Whether they’re taking on recognizable people and reimagining them, or creating entirely new and vibrant characters, you’re sure to be drawn in. I wanted to quiz The Girls about their most controversial pieces, their future projects, and how feminism fits into the picture.

Aside from looking at artists who happen to be feminist, or happen to be women, I also want to look at how key events in history have led to the creation of art that inspires support of feminism. One example of this is Votes for Women and the suffragettes and suffragists who wanted to achieve gender equality for the electorate.

It's a complex debate, because not all men had the vote when women began campaigning to be included, and women of color were not included at all in most of these movements. Countries around the world were routinely governed using the political beliefs of rich men, which is clearly something we can relate to today with the Occupy protests fresh in our minds. The 1% not had all of the wealth but they also had the power to change how the country was run. Although we might feel that we have it bad in 2011, we really have made much progress compared to life before electoral democracy in the Western world. I want to highlight some of the key movers and shakers in suffrage activism.

The Harlem Renaissance was a major cultural movement in the 20th century by black artists from the Harlem neighborhood in New York. Although the precise dates of the Renaissance are vague, the artwork remains strong and powerful to this day. Here are some of the women artists of the era.

Not only is this guest blog about exploring who has made a contribution to feminist art, which movements embrace women and which galleries support it, but also how we all encountered (and continue to encounter) it. When did you first see an artwork that portrayed women in a positive light? What are your must-see images? How would you introduce the topic to someone who only thinks of the "great artists" as men? Let's talk.

"There is no separation between me and what I photograph," said the artist Nan Goldin. This has never been truer than with the self-portrait that captures her injuries caused by an abusive boyfriend. Domestic violence is never an easy subject to talk about, but this image speaks volumes.

Her artistic career may have been short—she was taking photos for only nine years of her life—but Francesca Woodman left behind over 800 images when she died in 1981. She commands enough attention, 30 years after her death, to merit a retrospective at San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art, which will move on to the Guggenheim in 2012. What is the lingering hold that she has over art lovers?