The Guerrilla Girls

Last night, I was fortunate enough to go to the following event at the Georgia Museum of Art, as announced on the Guerrilla Girls Facebook Page:
Guerrilla Girl Frida Kahlo and curator Neysa Page-Lieberman will be talking about the exhibition "Not Ready To Make Nice" at the Georgia Museum of Art tomorrow at 5:30pm. http://georgiamuseum.org/…/panel-discussion-guer…/2015/02/19

The Guerrilla Girls first came to being in 1985, around the time I was first starting school. Therefore, I knew very little about them or their work until the event last night. As a feminist and as a female writer, I was very inspired both both the exhibit and by way "Frida Kahlo" and Neysa Page-Lieberman had to say. I was disappointed, although not surprised, to hear that most of the major galleries in the world have very few, if any, exhibits that feature women and/or people of color. Also, only four women have been nominated for the Best Director Oscars award, and the only woman to ever win it has been Kathryn Bigelow, in 2009, for The Hurt Locker.

It took until 2009 for a woman to win the award for Best Director? Really? Perhaps we haven't progressed as much as I thought we had. It made me even more happy that I made the decision to become a female academic rather than fitting society's ideas of what women should do in this still very clearly patriarchal society.  Also, the exhibit included the statistic that 92-93% of writing awards have gone to men. Women may dominate programs related to theater, art, and writing, but we don't seem to get the leadership roles or win the awards. Clearly, something is wrong here.  I am both angry and even more determined to get recognition for my writing. Also, as my classmates and I discussed last night after the event, we female artists need to support each other rather than tearing each other down.  I think that's part of what the Guerrilla Girls is about.

The Guerrilla Girls wear guerrilla masks. This is, in part, to show their solidarity and their assertiveness in a world in which women who want to shine in art and other careers must be assertive. Also, I believe this mask is symbolic of the fact that women sometimes still feel silenced. For these women to speak up with criticisms of pop culture and art, they must wear masks, or they could risk losing their day jobs and their art gigs. Would this possibility be as real if they were men? I still feel that if a man speaks up, he's assertive, but if a woman speaks up, she's a bitch. When is this going to change?

The art exhibit and the interview with Frida Kahlo were both powerful and personal ways to share information and to make the world more aware of a phenomenal group of women. To me, this event was an effective example of public scholarship. Research still occurred, yet it was depicted in the form of art and of an on-stage interview. I do hope that some of my scholarship can be read, understood, and appreciated by a public audience.