I had a paper on feminism due about two weeks ago, I never wrote it, it's just the rough draft but I could use your help. I don't know much about you, but I do know you know a hell of a lot about art, thus I have come to you.
I am writing a paper on themes in contemporary art, and I chose feminism, because my art deals with sexuality and identity and a whole lot of shit I don't feel like going into, but I thought it tied in a little bit with feminism or the idea of it.
Anyways, I have the idea for my paper. But I need your help with identifying some current artists exploring feminist ideas in their work, defining shows for the feminist movement, currently, and in the past.
That's all. If you could help i'd really appreciate it. I just figured you'd have something to offer that google does not.

The paper itself isn't due for another week so i'll just write my rough draft and if you have good suggestions I can make changes for the final.

well, cp (i don't know your real name) feminism is an extremely broad (hahaha) term.

the first person that comes to mind is one of my favorites: jenny saville.
her work (huge 15' high paintings) deal with female body image. in some of her work she usues her own body as a model and also a pre- and post op- sex change patient. she studied a lot of surgical images and some of them can be daunting. not all of her work is like this though. two of my favorite paintings by her are "shift" and "juncture 1994" which i saw in person and was completely overwhelmed by.

go here and then at the right click on "territories" which was a solo show and then "the figure in and out of space and find the painting "shift."
http://www.gagosian.com/artists/jennysaville/

here's another site with more images although the information is weak:
http://www.geocities.com/craigsjursen/iMAGES.html

google her. somewhere i found an interview of her by elton john. kinda funny. most of her work was done in the early 90's and was part of her master's thesis or whatever they call it in england. charles saatchi bought the entire show and eventually made a fortune.

i can think of a lot of contemporary female artists but off hand none with a feminist bent. i also just woke up so i'm a little foggy. if i think of more i'll post. definitely use saville.

wish you lived closer because then i could loan you the book from the territories show.

I can't believe I never thought of using her. Thank you so much. I have the predecessors but I just need people working today to prove that feminism is in fact a huge theme in modern art.

oh yeah, kiki smith.
there's a retrospective at the san francisco moma.
i missed it when it was in nyc.

http://www.sfmoma.org/exhibitions/exhib ... asp?id=206

I just read something about her. Seems very interesting. Thank you for your help

Kindly excuse me for butting in, but I would like to recommend a Bay Area-based artist/photographer whose work plays quite well to feminist interpretation.

Rachel Weeks - http://rachelanne.net

Obnerians helping Obnerians. I'm feeling the warmth.

Oh, i'd love help from anyone. Thank you hot wax, I haven't turned my draft in yet so I still have time to add artists.

hotwax, thanks for posting the rachel weeks site. i think you turned me on to her sometime last year or so and i like her work.

her self portraits are pretty and obviously personal just as she states. her landscapes are also pretty. i think she needs to move beyond the personal because the work starts to feel a bit repetitive and relies on technique more than content. she just needs to do a little more editing. people should check her out because it's interesting stuff.

that said, i would so love to draw her.

me too, ayah. (i'd love to draw her, I mean)

Yeah, she gets that criticism alot; her professors would agree with your comments.

She is now represented by the Stephen Wirtz gallery in San Francisco, and was written up by Art in America magazine (January 2006 issue). In addition, her latest group show opened on Tuesday.

www.wirtzgallery.com

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I'm trying to think of other artists that might interest you two (or whoever is reading this thread).

this is a series of photographs taken by irving penn. they are photos of the dancer alexandra beller from the bill t. jones dance company and were shot in four different seessions with a criteria set for each session. they show such strength and are much more powerful in person.

http://www.ultrawet.net/10cent/scan/pen ... ancer1.htm

glad to see rachel weeks getting attention. is she a friend of yours?

ayah those photographs blew me away.

yeah, me too when i first saw them. i was a little shocked at first but i think i was just overwhelmed by how she used her body in such a bold and powerful way. (i know that's a bad sentence)

apparently she was an extremely gifted dancer despite her size. i wish i could have seen her dance. must've been incredible.

she is beautiful. that website also has philippe halsman's photographs on it, which were really great.
do you know when those photographs were taken? i guess i could use google and find out myself, but the images were extremely powerful. they were very surreal in a way, as well. she seemed larger than life.

we've known each other for a few years.

the photos were done in 1999.
the book from the show is called dancer by irving penn.
her name is alexandra beller and if you google her in images you'll see just how beautiful she is.

i'd post them here but i'm way too lazy for that.

are either of you artists?

i'll answer for cp.
yes and yes.

you?

are you

no. i am only a writer.

what subjects does your art reference?
are you photographers, painters, sculptors; perhaps a combination?

i paint/draw. i'm 17 so i'm a "beginner" even though i've been doing it forever.
i've made two short films. i want to keep doing that but i don't have access to a video camera all the time. if i did i wouldn't stop making them.

isn't that weird?
i wish i could write.
i make up for it by trying to be a very good reader.

my focus is the figure but i'll draw anything.
most of my work has been comprised of large format charcoal drawings.
i've dabbled on and off in painting with minor success but lately i've been trying to make a go of it with a new technique. we'll see.

the only image i have uploaded is this one. it's two years old and was part of a suite of four drawings. the work is getting much more expressive and slightly more abstract these days.

this is about four and a half feet high and not a great reporoduction at all.