Women in the Picture is a very informative and, despite its difficult topic, enjoyable read. For anyone interested in understanding the connection between art, culture, self-perception, race and much more, this is a crucial starting point. Jennifer Aniston has always been living proof that you can, in fact, get better-looking every year — and her 2008 GQ cover wearing nothing but a tie at age 40 was just one more bit of evidence (see here via Time). How is it that their works were in storerooms until recently? Maestras is a feminist exhibition that seeks to emphatically correct the prejudices that have come about as a result of the patriarchy – prejudices that have meant that works by female artists have remained in museum storerooms during the 20th century.”

women: Madrid show puts forgotten artists in the picture Hidden women: Madrid show puts forgotten artists in the picture

A well written and important art history book - one of those rare art history books where an art novice won't feel out of their depth' ― FAD magazine

Alicia Silverstone

Among the show’s early exhibits is one of Gentileschi’s anguished studies of Susanna and the Elders, while the later pieces include Mary Cassatt’s bleary-eyed Breakfast in Bed and Maruja Mallo’s playful Fair pictures.

Women in the Picture: Women, Art and the Power of Looking

She does cover a lot of cultural ground. I was not very interested in her commentaries on current society such as Beyonce and sexism in advertising (hardly a new topic). However, the book tries to draw connection between classical and contemporary art. This is the part where the text is not coherent and arguments suffer from oversimplification. Seventeenth-century works by Artemisia Gentileschi, Fede Galizia and Elisabetta Sirani give way to still lifes of fruit and flowers before the exhibition moves to portraits – including Élisabeth Louise Vigeé Le Brun’s Lady Hamilton as a Bacchante – and then to Orientalism, depictions of working women, images of maternity, sisterhood and, finally, to images of female emancipation. For those interested there is the “National Museum of Women in the Arts” dedicated solely to female artists in Washington DC. year-old Alicia Silverstone bared it all for a good cause on Dec 20 in a PETA campaign against animal leather. “I never, ever, get naked in TV, in film, nothin’, never, nope — but I’ve done it for PETA because that’s how much it matters to me,” she said in the campaign’s behind the scenes video. She added, “I’d rather go naked than wear animals.” In the final picture, Silverstone is seen wearing nothing but cowboy boots as she covers herself up in a sexy pose in a cactus field.This book looks at art history and its way of shaping contemporary constructions of femininity, female bodies, and sexuality. My assumption is that today, works of art influenced by culture and works of art influencing culture are not easily distinguishable. That's why discussions of sexism in modern art and media and pop culture, and blaming Renaissance artworks - which are mostly reflections of their own time and culture - without considering politics, economics and other intersectional topics, were not convincing. And there are occasions where she does present contrary points of view like “The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago (currently at the Brooklyn Museum). There were, however, “certain moments and certain places” in which conditions were more favourable to female artists, and the show aims to offer “a series of windows through which we can see a mutual understanding and a camaraderie between artists, gallery owners and patrons”. This is the better, and my favorite part of the book as it gives you new tools for observing art and helps you interpret and criticize art independently.