I asked my Gen Z son to name three famous artist men.
Monet
Warhol
Van Gogh
Easy. He didn’t even think about it, they just rolled off his tongue. Interesting that he named dead artists.
I asked my Gen Z son to name three famous artist women.
Frida Kahlo
The one who does mountains that look like vaginas
Tracey Something
At least he tried to name someone who’s still alive.
These are typical responses to those questions.
And this is why I write the Beyond Frida series, a monthly essay that champions the art of an artist woman beyond the famous names.
Most folks I ask can name three famous artist men without too much thought. Normally it’s Picasso first. It’s usually the artists studied in school if they were fortunate enough to study art in school; most kids paint some kind of Van Gogh sunflower or a Picasso-style portrait.
When it comes to famous artist women, most non-artists I ask struggle to name three. Nine times out of ten, Frida Kahlo is the artist they remember first. Great marketing by the Frida Kahlo Corporation! Then, just like my son, they can visualise the work of another artist woman but can’t quite grasp her name.
This is why I write the Beyond Frida series: to s/hero the art of women beyond those whose legacy is supported by huge corporations. Because honestly, if that’s what’s required to keep the name of a woman artist on the lips of everyday folk, then we have a problem.
And yes, we DO have a problem.
I love Frida Kahlo’s legacy, who doesn’t? But when one artist is put on a pedestal that’s so high it requires a corporation to maintain it; when her work is commodified to the point where you can’t walk into a store without seeing a shower curtain, a t-shirt, a mug bearing her face, then that HAS to mean other artists are being denied those resources and are being marginalised.
Can you name another woman Mexican artist?
(If you can’t, please tune in to the next Beyond Frida article last week of February. Subscribing is the best way to not miss it, wink wink.)
Laurel Wickersham Salisbury wrote an article in 2019 for the Center for Art Law in which she said:
Art both creates and possesses cultural value, but this value can also be monetized, and, increasingly in today’s society, commercialized.
Witness the juggernaut-sized immersive art experiences that roll into town like a circus: Banksy, Van Gogh, Dali, Warhol. Where are the women? Oh wait, I just saw that the production company Exhibition Hub is creating an immersive experience around the work of…wait for it…Frida Kahlo! Of course.
Whatever you think of these immersive experiences, the fact that so much attention is being given to ONE artist immediately affords their work more value—in both a cultural and commercial sense.
Attention leads to value. And the corporations know this.
If we want artist women to hold a more valuable position in the art world, we must draw more attention to them and their work.
Hence this series
I’m a bit of an artist archaeologist: I excavate the stories of artist women.
Sometimes there is very little information online about an artist and I have to piece together snippets of newspaper articles, blogs, and clippings from art sale websites.
Sometimes there's so much information (as there is with Frida Kahlo) that I have to consider historical bias and whether what’s written is myth or truth.
What I’ve learned after a year of writing Beyond Frida is that as artist women, we must keep a record of our work. Please!
And don’t rely on digital records.
My advice is to download your Instagram feed now! Print it out in a book (there are online services that will do this for you). Write your memoir and self-publish it; print out photos of your art, bind the pages yourself and hand copies to all your best friends and family; share your work! And share it widely and generously.
Leave breadcrumbs for future artist archaeologists to find.
Frida Kahlo ran in a pack of three women artists who supported each other through heartbreak, betrayal, artistic failure and success. I was going to write about one of Frida’s friends today but as I did the research and put my pitchfork into the story, I realised that the three artists cannot be separated. I need more time to do justice to the story of their friendship and I hope you’ll hang around until the end of February to read it!
Let’s never forget that these RockStar Artists—the likes of Georgia O’Keefe, Andy Warhol, Van Gogh— whom we place on pedestals so high we can barely see the real artist, never worked alone. We may see their work in isolation now (because that’s of commercial benefit) but no artist creates completely alone, despite the lonely artist in their garret trope. We are all influenced by other artists. We all run in a pack.
I’m fortunate to run with incredible artist women who are like sisters to me. When I think of artist women, it’s THEIR names that come to mind first, not Frida, Georgia nor Louise. As great as those artists were, and their legacies are, the ghost of Georgia O’Keefe isn’t going to turn up and help me stretch a canvas. Tracey Emin won’t call me to offer support when I’m rejected from an exhibition. Cindy Sherman’s not going to turn up in my studio to take my portrait. But women from my artist’s pack will and HAVE done all those things.
May we keep the names of our artist friends on our lips. May we support each other here in the Private View community and beyond. May we be each others’ cheerleaders, patrons, sisters.
Until next time.
JC
RESOURCES TO HELP YOU:
1. Turn your Instagram or blog into a book with Blog2Print
2. I also like the small 5.5”x5.5” books that Artifact Uprising offers
3. This is an interesting article: Rolling Over in Her Grave: Frida Kahlo’s Trademarks and Commodified Legacy
4. A good read about Fridamania: Fridolatry: Frida Kahlo and Material Culture
5. A review of the Van Gogh experience in London from the Guardian: So long ‘immersive Van Gogh’: we deserve better than this cynical and elitist approach to art
Oh my, I’m no artist of renown but it might be worth compiling my text and images (I guess the video can’t be captured) for my Soul Deep Project.
It’s a good idea to download from Insta and amazing how we/I might not think ourselves worthy enough xxx I am going to resolve to do this. Thank you x