Female Representations in Irish Art Institutions

FEMALE REPRESENTATION IN IRISH ART INSTITUTIONS REPRESENTATION

WORDS BY Libby Phillips

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Guerrilla Girls, Let’s Toast Irish Art, Lads (Pssst: Not So Fast, Lasses), 2010 Purchase, with funds from the Print Committee © Guerrilla Girls

‘Th e Finkbeiner Test’, developed by journalists Christie Aschwanden and Ann Finkbeiner, is a seven-part checklist used to avoid superfl uous gender discussion in academic articles. In refl ecting upon using the test in her writing, Finkbeiner noted: “Th e fact that she’s the fi rst woman to do that [win a particular award] says a lot more about the prize-giving committee than it does about her.” Th is quote came to mind immediately when I came across a piece from the Whitney Museum of American Art archive online, Let’s Toast Irish Art, Lads (Pssst: Not So Fast, Lasses) from the Guerrilla Girls Portfolio. Th e piece, a print done in 2010, pointed out how male-dominated the Irish art scene was at the time. Th e Guerrilla Girls, an anonymous, anarchist, feminist art collective founded in 1985, is still active today. Th eir mission is to call attention to gender imbalances in all spheres of society through performance and visual media campaigns. In their piece on Irish institutions, they cover museums, galleries, art schools and awards. A decade ago, each of these were male dominated. For example, the collection of the National Gallery of Ireland (NGI) was 95% men and the solo exhibitions in the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) were made up of 86% men in 2009. I reached out to some of these places to inquire as to whether female representation has increased in the last ten years, either by conscious eff orts or unconsciously, and to fi nd out if there were any intentions to provide recognition for women in Irish art. NGI stated it recognizes the gender imbalance in their collection and “is committed to addressing this imbalance.” Th is eff ort has led to the acquisition of 47 works by women since 2017, with an additional 79 by men for a total of 126 new works. Some of these women include Dorothy Cross, Mary Swanzy and Amelia Stein. NGI noted the following exhibitions either focused on a female artist or “had a large female representation”:

• Margaret Clarke: An Independent Spirit (13 May – 20 August 2017) • Käthe Kollwitz: Life, Death and War (6 September - 10 December 2017) • In[Visible]: Irish Women Artists from the Archives (19 July 2018 – 2 March 2019) • Markievicz: Portraits & Propaganda (27 October 2018 - 2 March 2019) • Making their Mark: Irish Painter-Etchers & the Etching Revival (2 March - 30 June 2019) • Shaping Ireland: Landscapes in Irish Art (20 April - 7 July 2019)

Th e gallery has obviously made steps to represent women more prominently in their collection. Th eir upcoming exhibition, Drawn from Nature: Irish Botanical Art, in which female artists created 64% of the works, opened on 7 March.