Danger! Women Artists at Work

Book excerpt: The conventional history of art is one of great men making great paintings, and displaying their works to a predominantly male audience in male-run institutions. Women, however, have had a role, often working behind the scenes, out of sight or in resistance to prevailing attitudes and practices. And it is in these exceptions to the rules of the masculine world of art-making that women artists have been perceived as groundbreaking, defiant and even subversive. A compelling selection of more than 60 artists from the early Renaissance to the present day, among them Judith Leyster, Mary Cassatt, Frida Kahlo and Louise Bourgeois, Danger! Women Artists at Work explores the most intriguing and provocative aspects of art by women who shook up the art world. Through a lively introduction and six thematic chapters dealing with such subjects as the ways in which women have challenged the boundaries of expression and how they have viewed the human body, Debra N. Mancoff presents an absorbing tale of those who have struggled and triumphed in their efforts to transform the visual arts.