How the artist denounce the restrictions of women’s rights ?

“Comment les artistes dénoncent les restrictions des droits des femmes”

“How the artist denounce the restrictions of women’s rights?”

I- women in the art-world : the XX century

For many years, in a world where men dominate, women all around the world have been fighting to get the rights they deserve, to get the equality.

Before the twentieth century, women artists struggled to participate in the male-dominated art world. Along with the educational limitations, female artists were forbidden to sketch from live models because it compromised their integrity. Proper social protocol would suggest that self-expression of a female was limited to bearing children and conforming to proper social etiquette.

In order to contradict this thought, some women artists rejected social protocol of marriage to pursue freedom within their artistic expressions because most of the time, it was their husbands who prevented them from expressing themselves.

These pioonering female artists laid the foundation for equality of artistic freedom despite the harsh regulations placed on their paintings.

They would incorporate feminist meanings into their work and wanted to remove the gender label from their artworks. The purpose of de-gendering their art was to compete and find recognition of their talents within the art society.

Take the example of Niki de Saint Phalle, she was born in 1930 in France but she grew up in the US, she had a really hard life with many hardships, mostly because of men, which inspired her for her art, she is defined as “a child of depression”. She found therapy in art, so it was impossible for her to be denied this right. She did a lot of women body’s sculpture to express the fact that she was an involved feminist.

II – The Handmaid’s Tale : Still inspire today’s causes

Lets talk about Margaret Atwood's novel, The Handmaid’s Tale written in 1985, better know now thanks to the show, it story refers to the society where patriarchy reigns and where women are disenfranchised for their rights and reduced to sexual slavery. This novel became a symbol of the struggle for women’s rights, it was the starting point of a protest movement. This still inspire political and feminist frays ; a few years ago, at least 30 activists protested infront of the Capitol in handmaid's tale gear, which represents the clothes of a maidservant, to fight the health care bill, including abortion. It continues to inspire women all around the world.

In closure, the evolution of the women freedom illustrates the level of bias within the education and opportunities offered to the early women artists.

All their lives, women have rebelled, demonstrated and fought against inequality, which is unfortunately still the case today ; few artists tryed to denounced the inequality and defended women’s rights, some of them have done it all their lives, as if it were the purpose of their existence.

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