National Museum for Women in the Arts

¶ … Women's Museums

The National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington is a museum specifically focused on bringing a gender-focused study to the achievements of women in the different artistic fields, whether literature, visual art, or performance art. The museum highlights the achievements of women artists by collecting and showcasing paintings and sculptures (the museum boasts a collection of 4,5000 objects created by women), presenting "10 world-class exhibitions of women artists each year," operating a publishing house, programming concerts, films and staged performances, educating the public, and sponsoring committees around the world dedicated to advocating for female artists (NMWA, 2015). While the museum is thus clearly dedicated to supporting the voice of women and their artistic expressions, the museum itself does raise questions about the issue of gender within the wider scope of the total global and historical artistic/cultural experience of not only modern day society but also of societies throughout time. The museum itself did not open until 1987, after the Women's Movement in the U.S. had been underway for a considerable number of years. Therefore its achievement in serving as a spotlight for women artists is relatively recent and its effect/impact on the artistic world is one that must be qualitatively assessed through an in-depth analysis of both what the museum itself does and what it and other efforts -- like that of the International Museum of Women -- mean for art and women in general. This paper will assess the museum's role in shedding light and perspective on women's place in art, in history and in everyday life and answer the question as to why there is a separate museum "for" women and what it means.

The mission of the National Museum of Women in the Arts is to bring "recognition to the achievements of women artists of all periods and nationalities by exhibiting, preserving, acquiring, and researching art by women and by teaching the public about their accomplishments" (NMWA, 2015). It thus addresses what it calls a "gender imbalance" in the way that art is presented in the world in the modern era, and by focusing solely on the contributions of female artists, the museum aims to close the gap between attention give to works by men and attention give to works by women. The museum thus acts as an extension of the Women's Movement by expanding the core issues of the movement (gender equality) into the realm of the arts and promoting a more level playing field by bringing attention to works by female artists. For this reason, the museum houses thousands of works by women and promotes educational material for persons interested in what it means to be a woman in art.

One of the ways in which the museum raises awareness is through the presentation of provocative questions to its audience, such as "Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?" (Guerilla Girls, 2012). The question challenges the notion that women in artistic presentation have to serve as sex symbols or objects of the "male gaze" as Mulvey (1975) called it (p. 7). The point that the museum makes is that women in the modern era continue to be objectified and, as the Guerilla Girls note, "less than 4% of the artists in the Modern Art sections are women, but 76% of the nudes are female" (Guerilla Girls, 2012). Thus, the museum identifies the problem it seeks to address, and by housing works of art that serve to better represent womanhood in the creative realm rather than in the objectified realm, the museum looks to close the gender gap in art. After all, ass NMWA notes, "Art is a reflection of society" and if society is allowed to get away with objectifying women while rendering their contributions to the artistic reflection of the world null and void, then leaders within society who seek a more balanced and representative reflection of the world must labor, as the museum does, to give voice and outlet to women artists.

Historically speaking, this is a somewhat revolutionary endeavor, which challenges the age-old patriarchal system of artistic development. Again, it is NMWA which states that "for centuries, social conventions limited the training available to women artists, the subjects they could render, and the ways they could market art to patrons" (Advocate, 2015). This gender bias, rooted in the hegemony of the patriarchal society that dominated Western culture for centuries, began to be exposed by the Women's Movements of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Thus, with exhibitions featuring the works over 1,000 female artists, the NMWA promotes women's rights in the arts community and devotes itself to reshaping the way in which the world is reflected by giving women a greater and more visible role in that reflective process. Exhibitions include works by Priya Pereira's Contemporary Artists' Books from India, Pop-Ups by Colette Fu, and prints by Alison Saar. The museum also has 16th-17th Century, 18th-19th Century, 20th Century, and Contemporary collections, all of which make up the over 4,000 works that are kept and by the museum.

The museum also provides workshops for individuals, teachers and schools as well as events for the public that serve to promote the ender of ridding the art world of gender bias. Some of its events include Free Community Days, in which the museum is open to the public for free, Reading Club days (for which reservations are required and participants can read and discuss literature by women writers), Gallery Talk days (a series open to the public with a discussion led by the museum's curatorial assistant), writing workshops, and festivals featuring live performances of female artists. Each of these events, workshops and exhibitions help to support the mission of the museum in its aim to promote women's equality.

Throughout history, the role of women has largely been relegated to the domestic sphere. With a few exceptions, as in the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta, where women played a much more dominant and influential role in the city's political and social life (as opposed to Athens, where the woman's "place" was the home), women have mostly led a life of domestic activity, even if their proclivities and talents have been to produce works of art deserving of a place in the sun alongside those of men. Female writers, for instance, often used masculine pseudonyms in order to get their works published (female writers were not considered serious). Writers like Aphra Behn, George Sand and Emily Dickinson had to challenge the system, change their names or remain unpublished for the duration of their lifetime (Dickinson's fame came only after her death when the majority of her poems were found under her bed in a box by her sister-in-law).

In the 20th century, the Women's Movement began to gain steam, led by women like Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinhem. These women popularized the idea that women could lead a productive and contributive life outside the domestic sphere, and they challenged the concept that women had to be objectified house kittens for their husbands like the TV show housewife stereotype. The Women's Movement brought attention to the idea that women deserved equal opportunity in the workplace. In the art world, this concept began to be promoted in arts as well, through the work of artists like Nan Goldin, whose photographs in the 1980s and 1990s showed a side of life that had never been photographed before -- including pictures of spousal abuse and transgender couples. Gender issues were beginning to mount and gain attention as a result. Thus it was that in the 1980s, the National Museum of Women in the Arts opened to celebrate the role of women in the arts: it was a direct response to the evolution of the woman's role in society over the decades and centuries that had preceded it.

In this sense, it is accurate to separate/alienate the subject of "women" from the common or from the collective experience, because theirs is an experience that has been marginalized or sidelined throughout history and that is only now really beginning to receive public focus and attention in the West through the efforts of museums like NMWA. Other museums are also active in the pursuit of ending gender bias and elevating women's equality in the realm of the arts. The International Museum of Women (IMOW), for example, in San Francisco, has as its goal the objective "to value the lives of women around the world" by engaging in work that "amplifies the voices of women worldwide through history, the arts, and cultural exhibits and programs that educate, create dialogue, build community, and inspire action" (Offen, Colton, 2007, p. 19). Like the NMWA, the IMOW promotes women's rights, women's equality, and women's contributions to society in an effort to close the gender gap around the world. It is a truly global exercise and expansion of the Women's Movement from the political realm to the socio-historical and cultural realm.

By following the example of these museums, other mainstream museums like the Metropolitan Museum in New York (targeted by the NMWA and the Guerilla Girls as promoting sexism and the objectification of women via the "male gaze") can give place to women and their role in history by reorienting their position towards the gender issue and adopting a strategy of closing the gender gap as well. By showing so few works by women in its museum, the Met perpetuates the gender gap caused by gender bias, and by showing so many nudes in paintings that are proportionally skewed to showcase women, the Met perpetuates the notion that women are eye-candy for men. While one could certainly argue that the Met is simply displaying works of art that were painted in a specific era, reflecting the orientation of the patriarchy of that era, there is still no reason that the Met could not give more space to women artists and reflect that actual contributions that they have made to society and the art world, too.

The role of women in art, history and everyday life is made evident by the promotions of museums like the NMWA and the IMOW. This role shows her women around the world have found and continue to find and exercise their voices in public, private, social, political, artistic, economic and spiritual spheres. From religion to government, women leaders are more dominant today than ever before. Women lead countries, like in Germany; they lead banks, like at the IMF and Federal Reserve. And in everyday life, their role has become more pronounced, as women's rights and gender equality is discussed more openly than ever before. The expectations that have been placed on women by previous generations are changing in today's cultural climate and from the West to the Middle East to Asia, the way that women express themselves in day-to-day affairs, and the way that women express themselves on the public stage, whether stumping for political purposes or performing for entertainment, the spotlight is now on them to see what it is that they can do and how they can contribute in a more publicly recognized manner to the overall aims of global society.

The types of woman that museums dedicated to advancing the causes of women have made efforts to highlight are diverse. The National Museum of Women in the Arts has, for example, highlighted the role of women photographers hailing from Iran and the Arab World by promoting a workshop entitled "She Who Tells a Story." This workshop promotes the idea that even in cultures where women are viewed as having far fewer liberties than they have in the West, there is still an avenue by which these women can assert themselves and show that they are alive and thriving and full of vital interests and unique perspectives that contribute in a compelling manner to the global discourse on gender. Here, in this workshop, inspiration is taken from women whose heads are covered in head scarves, but who are smiling as they take pictures of their worlds and of themselves in a celebration of life. This is one type of woman that these museums put forward for the public to appreciate -- because it is a compelling way for people to integrate ideas about gender with ideas about culture and society. In the West especially there is a great deal of Islamaphobia resulting for the War on Terror and the various attacks and immigration escalation in recent years. This type of phobia stems from a misunderstanding about cultures and the differences in the ways in which societies express themselves and their own views on issues like gender and women. By celebrating women's voices and artistic expressions from Arab cultures, these museums are able to provide better and deeper understanding for Western audiences about who and what the women from this part of the world are really all about. They show that they are just like women all over the world, that they are part of the universal concept of womanhood, too.