Essay by Luke Foster
“Guerrilla Girls is an anonymous group of feminist, female artists devoted to fighting sexism and racism within the art world. The group formed in New York City in 1985, born out of a picket against the Museum of Modern Art the previous year. The core of the group’s work is bringing gender and racial inequality into focus within the greater arts community and society at large. The Guerrilla Girls employ culture jamming in the form of posters, books, billboards, lectures, interviews, public appearances and internet interventions to expose disparities, discrimination, and corruption (the latter includes conflicts of interest within museums). They also often use humour in their work to make their serious messages engaging.”
Wikipedia
I first heard about the Guerrilla Girls and the movie A League of their Own starring Madonna in the early nineties. Its my favourite movie role by Madonna.
One is about women in art and the other is about women in sport so in that way they are linked.
The League of Their Own was set during the second world war in America and they started a league of women baseball teams as most of the men from the male teams were serving in the army.
“A League of Their Own is a 1992 American sports comedy drama film directed by Penny Marshall that tells a fictionalized account of the real-life All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). It stars Tom Hanks, Geena Davis, Madonna, Lori Petty, Rosie O’Donnell, Jon Lovitz, David Strathairn, Garry Marshall, and Bill Pullman. It was written by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel from a story by Kelly Candaele and Kim Wilson.
A League of Their Own was a critical and commercial success, grossing over $132.4 million worldwide and garnering acclaim for Marshall’s direction and the performances of its ensemble cast. In 2012, the Library of Congress selected it for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.”
These days the gap is closing for women in high end art exhibitions in museums and exposure in top end women’s sport such as tennis and golf. However there still needs to be much more recognition of women in these fields and equal prize money for women and sale prices at auction and in galleries for women artists.
Famous women artists present and past who command big sales and critical acclaim include Frida Kahlo, Louise Bourgeois, Georgia O’Keeffe and Yayoi Kusama.
“New York is the place that made my and other artists’ dreams come true by giving us a chance to realise our ideas and concepts. It was a great place for making a presentation of artistic creation.”
Yayoi Kusama
In conclusion my favourite thing to watch on Instagram is videos of female skateboarders doing street skating and female surfers doing cool manoeuvres.