Feminism In Body Art

Feminism has been an extremely controversial and significant subject over the centuries. The issue of equality between men and women have been questioned and exceedingly debated upon, why men were treated and considered the ‘superior’ gender. During the 1960’s, civil rights, protests against war and gay and lesbian movements were at its peak. It was the period of time, which the Feminist art movement had emerged, also known as the “second-wave” of feminism, shifting away from modernism. Women wanted to gain equal rights as men within the art world. Feminist artists such as Cindy Sherman, Carolee Schneemann and Hannah Wilke pursued to change the world and perspectives on women through their artworks, specifically in body art. Their goal was to “influence cultural attitudes and transform stereotypes.” (DiTolla. T, 2013)

Feminist art had no singular medium or style that united Feminist women artists. It was often a combination of aspects from various movements, including conceptual art, body art, and video art into works that presented a message about women’s experience (DiTolla. T, 2013). However, it was body art that became the primary medium to express the protest against feminism. Female artists during this time wanted to approach art in non-traditional ways in order to change the world, and confront viewers with the prevailing feminist issues of the time.

Feminist artist, Cindy Sherman is renowned for her photographic series of works, which have raised important questions and challenges about roles, and representations of women within society and media. Sherman has been significant in areas which “studies the decentred self, the mass media’s reconstruction of reality, the inescapably of male gaze, the seductions of abjections,...

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...istic art world. (Wacks. D, 2009)

To conclude, the use of body for Feminist and Performance artists in the 1960s-1970s was significant in confronting the way women were viewed as artists in a male dominated art world. It was a vital element in raising consciousness and showing action towards the ideas of feminism. (Holt.J, 2009) Feminine nudity was a controversial problem, which female artists wanted to provoke in order to gain equality. The body became a form of expression to transform social stereotypes, and used as a primary medium, which reasserted aspects of a women’s figure that had been traditionally ignored or repressed by the male majority. (Holt.J, 2009) The body had just become one platform used by feminism and performance artists such as, Cindy Sherman, Carolee Schneemann and Hannah Wilke to rebel and promote their ideas, in order to gain equal rights.