So peeps, as I still continue to figure things out in the studio and endlessly search for a new apartment, I took today semi-off and watched a dvd a fellow BF artist, Karen Steen lent me.  Before I go on- check her out: www.karensteenfineart.com and while you are at it, please feel free to pick up one of her beautiful drawings for me.  I want one and my birthday is just around the corner :)

But the dvd Karen lent me was called “Who does she think she is?”  It chronicles 6 artists and interviews a number of curators and authors about women in contemporary art.  When I first started watching it, I was afraid it was going to be hokey, “find your inner goddess” stuff but I sunk into it and found that many of the women depicted have had similar experiences as myself.  I think I mentioned during this past fall when I saw Judy Chicago, that she made a strong statement that women artists “can’t have it all.”  This is a statement that many women, when hearing it, felt rather conflicted about.  Her statement was directed towards being a mother and being taken seriously as an artist.  I guess perceptions are a funny thing.  And so much rides on the image we create of ourselves….. I remember in grad school, we were told that if you want a career as an artist never EVER take a job as an art teacher below college.  Thank god, I never have wanted to do that (aside from community programs that are fun to do from time to time).  But I remember this statement so clearly that it would be “career suicide” as one professor put it.  They implied that being an art teacher will discredit your as a professor and a professional artist.  So there you go- this piece of advice was always a non-issue…. aside from my former inlaws dismay that I do not having a regular paycheck and benefits.  While I would like those things, I certainly like MORE living on my own terms- teaching who I chose and continuing my studio practice.  I think the bigger message here is that part of the game is all about perception.

Anyway…. perceptions aside, i would recommend watching this documentary as a great primer and realistic view of the female challenges of “making it.”  Not only are women under represented in every major museum around the world (less than 13% of museum collections nationwide are women; and of the MOMA’s 399 objects in their permanent collection, 19 are by women…. and yet the majority of students enrolled in MFA programs nationwide are women), women are additionally faced with societal expectations. The subtext of this dvd packaging is “A woman has to choose.  What if she didn’t?”  What if?  My experiences for my short time on this earth is that many people find pursuing my career as selfish, myopic even.  And many ask, “Don’t I want a family?  Don’t I want to be married again?”  and I often feel uncomfortable about these questions…. like what is wrong with me.  As I watched the dvd, one of the artists claimed her husband always accused her that art came first then him.  She confessed that she loved him more than anything and that art is just part of being- two different things.  Yet, her husband left her and sued her for full custody of her three children.  Her career was centered on selling work, therefore unpredictable but she was resourceful and unapologetic about it.  And still, her ex-husband sued her yearly for a plethora of things, seemingly draining her of her financial resources.  And she still made work, because it was all a part of being.  I can relate to that (even though I unfortunately seem disconnected from my work right now).  I think that when you are creative, it’s not necessarily a choice, it’s just something that happens.  My grandmother would sew all through the night- not because she had to, but I think because she couldn’t help herself.

Another aspect of choices is something I have observed with my friends in relationships while working in their career is responsibility.  I watched many of my friends split from their partners while I was in grad school.  They say grad school is a divorce maker for married couples.  I did witness that- long hours, partner feels abandoned and looks for emotional support elsewhere.  My friend made it through grad school only to find out that her husband had been having an affair that continued after she graduated and landed her tenure track job.  She is now divorced.  In this documentary, one of the women also handles a divorce as a result of her pursuit of her career.  Sometimes I’m bitter about circumstances like these.  I mean, I think many relationships really need to earnestly examine a fair displacement of domestic responsibility.  Gone are the days where households can function on one income where the woman can happily explore her domestic goddess-ness.  But I truly think these conventions still stick around.  And I think it’s so alarming for me because I watched my parents negotiate my mother’s pursuit of her career as a non-traditional student for many years.  And it was just normal that we all shared the responsibilities of a household while for the most part, my mother was not the one who happily cooked us dinner like most households.  Actually, she doesn’t even like to cook and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.  My observation though is that as a society “old habits die hard”- and I still see many women expected to fulfill ‘women’s work’ while maintaining a career.  And may I be so brazen to say that women are building a career while swimming upstream or while (100 years after the suffrage movement) recognition for what they do is still slim.  Have you realized that many female artists are/were childless?  Judy Chicago spoke to this specifically when I saw her speak.  She actually made it a decision to not be a mother.  She said for her to be taken seriously, she had to.  I sometimes wonder if that is really still true…..  It seems hard for me to believe but then I see how some of my friends children exhaust them.

While in grad school, I was brow beaten to take a stance as  a Feminist.  I denied it for a long time and I sometimes am not sure about the term, as it comes with so much stigma.  But I guess it’s safe to say that my feelings reside with that equality.  It’s safe to say that I guess I never thought about it so much because really, I was raised with that equality.  I have always been around an even disbursal of responsibility.  It’s part of my upbringing.

If you want to check out this dvd and some of the artists that are a part of the dvd, here’s the link: www.whodoesshethinksheis.net