A great variety of art. Not a great variety of artists.

An image from the Hackney Hoard show at Galerie 8

This year I have written in celebration of the Max Mara Art Prize for women, showcased at the Whitechapel Gallery in London. The Whitechapel has an excellent track record in supporting women artists: its comeback show after months of restoration featured the work of Goshka Macuga and Isa Genzken, amongst others. Even the thinking behind the Turner Prize, notorious within the art world for being awarded to such a small number of women artists over the long duration of its history, has transformed in the last ten years, with a marked increase in women shortlistees and women winners. This is all to the credit of the art world, which has been quicker on its feet than the literary and classical music worlds when it comes to crediting women for our creativity and intellect. Recent major exhibitions and retrospectives in the UK have given cultural space to Maria Lassnig, Polly Morgan, photographer Dorothy Bohm (at Manchester Art Gallery), Marina Ambramovich, Fiona Banner, Nancy Spero, Annette Messager, Eva Rothschild, Tracey Emin (currently on at the Hayward) and Susan Hiller and I have every hope that this trend will continue. In the last few years Emin and Barbara Kruger have represented Britain and America respectively at the Venice Biennale (Emin being only the 2nd female artist ever to do so) and I hope their presence counteracts somewhat the utterly damning art world statistics given on the Guerilla Girls' brilliant posters, which I saw at the 2005 Biennale.

It's heartening to see an entire international industry and a great and grand discipline with centuries of history change in so short a time. I feel hopeful...until I read Brian Sewell's openly misogynistic ripdowns of Tracey Emin and Susan Hiller, until I realise that only one of the major newspapers picked up on the Women Make Sculpture show at the Pangolin Gallery - and until I get a press release like the below:

Hackney Hoard
Opening celebration: Thursday 21 July 2011 / 6 - 9 PM
With a special performance by Doug Fishbone

GALERIE8 proudly presents Hackney Hoard, a project initiated by celebrated artist and amateur London historian Adam Dant. The exhibition takes the discovery and narrative surrounding the find of the “Hackney Hoard” as a starting point and what follows, is an inquiry of the value and status placed on contemporary art objects.

Including an introduction by finder Terence Castle, and artworks by Adam Dant, Le Gun artists, Matthew Killick, Annabel Tilley, and Gavin Turk.

The Hackney Hoard exhibition is part of GALERIE8's summer opening series of events entitled Launching Pad to begin its residency within the Arthaus building. This diverse exhibition, both visual and interactive, engaging and reflective, will include a series based on events, sound and performance art, a publishing fair, film screenings and theatre evenings.

Le Gun are a collective of illustrators whose work is exciting, fresh and original. The collective is made up of 8 men and 1 woman. Of the rest of the named artists invited to participate in Hackney Hoard, there are 4 men (Adam Dant, Matthew Killick, Gavin Turk and Doug Fishbone) and 1 woman, Annabel Tilley. I am sure that all are excellent - as well as Le Gun, I love Gavin Turk's work. But don't tell me that a grand total of 12 men and 2 women participants is anything like a free and fair representation of all the possible creativity, genius, artistry, insight, history, performance, collaboration, energy and thinking that the show's organisers could have accessed. The PRs for these exhibitions are always, of course, female. I wonder how they feel, working so hard to support projects whose perks and credit go only to the men in power. I have run out of interest in perpetrators' excuses, lies and victim-blaming ("it's women's fault - women are scarce - shy - small - unpushy - having babies - emotional - absent - less bothered about success/fame/money/career"). Don't tell me that it's just a funny and sad coincidence that all the really really great work is done by men and all the really really shit work is done by women and, hey, that's just how it is. I mean, the current Galerie 8 show features a woman artist, Mary Yacoob, so they obviously know some. The audience for all cultural events in all disciplines from dance to music to literature to art to design to theatre is always at least half and usually majority female. We deserve better. Turn it around.

"I would rather be a rebel than a slave." Emmeline Pankhurst, happy birthday

Emmeline Pankhurst, mother of the British Suffragette movement, was born 153 years ago this week, on 14th July. To celebrate her legacy Charlotte Newson has created Women Like You, a photomosaic portrait of Pankhurst made up of 10,000 individual images of inspiring women - celebrities, mothers, daughters, politicians, scientists – all sent in by members of the public from all corners of the globe. The artwork took Charlotte two years to complete and stands 3 metres high and 2.5 metres wide.

To mark the date of Pankhurst’s birth on 14 July 1858, Charlotte has turned the Women Like You artwork into a virtual birthday card for women to either sign or post their image onto, creating a personal and very public birthday message to the woman whose legacy transformed the lives of women in this country. The e-card is displayed on Charlotte’s website, featuring the names and photographs of women from all over the world.

Living and working in Manchester, Charlotte Newson has over 20 years’ experience as an artist and has a residency at The Pankhurst Centre, a museum and women’s support space on Nelson Street in Manchester that was the home of Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters Sylvia, Christabel and Adela from 1897 – 1907.

Charlotte says:

“The original Women Like You portrait was a hugely moving labour of love for everyone involved and it created a great community of women who wanted to share their stories with the world.  Now, using the internet and social media networks, we’re able to give even more women the opportunity to leave their mark and become part of the Women Like You story with this birthday card tribute to Emmeline Pankhurst.”

To speak to Charlotte about the portrait or the legacy of feminism please contact Emma Beck on 07932 763 015 or email emma@lollipop-pr.com

And in the meantime, enjoy and be fired up by these Pankhurst quotes:

• Trust in God - she will provide.
• Deeds not words.
• Men make the moral code and they expect women to accept it.
• We have to free half of the human race, the women, so that they can help to free the other half.
• Justice and judgment lie often a world apart.
• We are here, not because we are law-breakers; we are here in our efforts to become law-makers.
• You have two babies very hungry and wanting to be fed. One baby is a patient baby, and waits indefinitely until its mother is ready to feed it. The other baby is an impatient baby and cries lustily, screams and kicks and makes everybody unpleasant until it is fed. Well, we know perfectly well which baby is attended to first. That is the whole history of politics. You have to make more noise than anybody else, you have to make yourself more obtrusive than anybody else, you have to fill all the papers more than anybody else, in fact you have to be there all the time and see that they do not snow you under.
• I know that women, once convinced that they are doing what is right, that their rebellion is just, will go on, no matter what the difficulties, no matter what the dangers, so long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion. I would rather be a rebel than a slave. I would rather die than submit;and that is the spirit that animates this movement…..I mean to be a voter in the land that gave me birth or they shall kill me, and my challenge to the Government is: kill me or give me my freedom: I shall force you to make that choice.

The Pankhurst timeline:

14 July 1858: Born Emmeline Goulden in Moss Side, Manchester.

1879: Marries Richard Marsden Pankhurst, a lawyer. Richard
had drafted an amendment to the Municipal Franchise
Act of 1869 which allowed unmarried women
householders to vote in local elections. He also wrote
the Married Women’s Property Acts in 1870 and 1882.

1880: Her daughter Christabel is born. She and Emmeline’s
second daughter Sylvia are also destined to become
prominent in the women’s suffrage movement. They
were joined by Adella the youngest daughter in the
early days of the campaign.

1889: Helps found the Women’s Franchise League.

1894: The league wins the right for married women to vote
in elections for local offices, but not for them to vote
for the House of Commons.

1898: Emmeline’s husband dies of a perforated ulcer.

1903: Founds the Women’s Social and Political Union
(WSPU) in Manchester.

1905: Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney are the first
suffragette’s to be jailed. They disrupted a public
meeting at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester, speakers
included Winston Churchill.

1906: Emmeline directs WSPU activities from London,
organising marches and campaigns against the
Liberal government. The women are disparaged as
“suffragettes” by the Daily Mail but the movement
proudly adopts the description.

1908-09: She is jailed three times.

1910: Emmeline is refused entry by the police to see Prime
Minister Asquith at the House of Commons to protest
against the dropping of the Conciliation Bill, which
would have given women the vote. Emmeline is
refused entry by the police. The protest develops into
a riot when the women clash with the police and over
100 women are arrested on charges varying from
disturbing the peace to assaulting police officers. The
day comes to be known to the suffragettes as ‘Black
Friday’.

1912: The WSPU becomes militant, with Christabel Pankhurst
directing arson attacks, window smashing, picture
slashing and hunger strikes from Paris, where she
has fled to avoid arrest for conspiracy. Emmeline is
arrested, released and rearrested 12 times within a year,
serving a total of about 30 days jail.

1914: When the First World War breaks out Emmeline and
Christabel call off the suffrage campaign to support
the war effort. During the war Emmeline visits the
United States, Canada and Russia to encourage the
mobilisation of women.

1918: The Representation of People Act is passed in February
giving the vote to women over 30.

1926: Emmeline returns to England and is chosen as the
Conservative candidate for an east London seat, but
her health fails before she can be elected.

1928: She dies on 14 June in London, a few weeks after the
Representation of the People Act establishing voting
equality for men and women is passed.



This text is taken from the press release for the project, full details of which are viewable at charlottenewson.com. Copyright for the text is hers, not mine.