Feminist Art Panel: Dr. Mary Senyonga, Dr. Elaine O'Brien, Vicki Hall, and Dr. Joanna Núñez

Women in the Humanities Present Feminist Art Panel

Thursday April 4, 2024

Dr. Mary Senyonga, Dr. Elaine O'Brien, Wicki Hall, M.F.A, and Dr. Joanna Núñez

Each speaker presented artworks and artists who provided visual representation regarding the censorship and backlash faced by women artists. Though some artworks are more easily acceptable today, even present in museum spaces, much of the subject matter is still deemed taboo and fighting for representation.

Vicki Hall talked about controversial artists Monica Sjöö, Judy Chicago, and Renèe Cox. Each faced censorship during their time due to the use of female nudity in their pieces. Monica Sjöö's (b.1938) piece God Giving Birth (1968) displays the vaginal birth of the universe from a woman god. It was deemed sacrilegious and pornographic, due to its presentation of god as a woman vaginally delivering the universe as its creation.

Monica Sjöö, God Giving Birth, (1968) 

Judy Chicago (b. 1939) made work against porn and its perpetuation of violence against women, childbirth, and its relation to death, as well as creation stories. Chicago despised pornography and made artwork against it, however, her well-known Dinner Party (1979), for instance, was deemed pornographic and was canceled for American showings. From there, the Dinner Party was shown in Europe exclusively.

Judy Chicago, Dinner Party, 1979

Jamaica-born artist, Renèe Cox (b. 1960) shows depictions of women in power. Originally a fashion photographer, she captures maternal figures as centers of beauty. She was accused of being "Anti-Catholic" when showing her piece Yo Mama's Last Supper (1996), which places the Judas figure as a white man. The outside sexualization of the female nude caused these artists to be looked down on and censored during their fight for freedom from oppression. 

Renèe Cox, Yo Mama's Last Supper (1996)

After Hall's presentation, Dr. Joanna Núñez discussed Queer Chicana Feminist Expression, specifically Queer Chicana women repurposing imagery of la Virgen de Guadalupe, imagery typically representative of the culture's idealized womanhood. Artists Ester Hernandez, Alma Lopez, Yolanda Lopez, and Xandra Ibarra each use this symbol in their artwork. Their versions of la Virgen challenge the typical positions she is placed in when "acceptably" used in art; In doing so, they challenge the idealized gender roles that women should exemplify. Typically the imagery of la Virgen, specifically Marianismo, was used as a form of control over women in Latin America, according to Dr. Nunez. 

Dr. Joanna Núñez presenting and Ester Hernandez' La Ofrenda (1988)

Alma Lopez created imagery of la Virgen embracing la Sirena (from the game Loteria) in a romantic way in her 1999 piece Lupe y Sirena In Love. Lopez' work was protested, she was threatened and accused of sexualizing la Virgen by representatives of the church.

Xandra Ibarra's video work La Virgensota Jota (2015) is a provocative display of everything feminine power can be through the Virgen image acting out how a woman "shouldn't be." Highly sexual, the performance pokes fun at these expectations. Despite Yolanda Lopez not being a Queer artist, she has contributed to challenging traditionalism and benefiting groups outside of herself. By modifying the image of la Virgen in her pieces, Lopez also faced censorship for her liberation of women in her work. 

When discussing the mistreatment these artists faced as a result of their art, Nunez points out that, perhaps people loved la Virgen a little more than they should have.

Alma Lopez, Lupe y Sirena in Love, 1999

Finally, Dr. Elaine O'Brien spoke about the importance of familiarity between women in a society dominated by men and the importance of inspiration by other women for other women. The ongoing exhibition, She Laughs Back: Feminist Wit in 1970s Bay Area Art, includes artists Lorraine Garcia Nakata, and Jean LaMarr. This show categorized second-wave feminist art in the Bay Area, including Sacramento. 

The area was an artistic and activist hub from the late 1960s to the 1980s. California State University Sacramento was one of the first institutions in both the nation and the world to include Women Studies as an academic subject. Political artwork in the 70's curated an historical environment for activism as supported by the CSU system. Patrons of diversity-- CSU and UC systems included women, people of color, and queer people alike-- coming into the center of scope as influenced by the establishment of groups like the Royal Chicano Airforce (RCA). Frank LaPena, Maidu artist and Sacramento State faculty member, contributed to what O'Brien refers to as the California Indian Renaissance. The occupation of Alcatraz inspired the Red Power, and the American Indians' Fight for Freedom, an anthology supporting native activism at the time: The painting on the cover by George Longfish. 

Other notable activists: Martin Luther King Jr. is recorded speaking at Sac State on October 16, 1967 (photographed by the State Hornet). Eldritch Clever, Betty Friedan, and Gloria Steinem spoke at Sac State in 197. Mandated inclusion in the '70s had Latinx and Asian professors working together for the first time. 

Dr. O'Brien displayed a Women's Studies Program brochure was printed in 1972, the beginning of women's studies at Sacramento State. Students held power and led activism. "Three full-time women professors join the Art Department Faculty." Laughter, humor, and wit in feminist artworks and publications provide a strategy for subverting restrictive forms of patriarchy. Liberation takes on many forms. Art politics and societal politics go hand in hand. Women Rulebreakers mocked and defined what it is a woman should be through the combination of fantasy, humor, and seriousness.

Watch Xandra Ibarra’s performance art, La Virgensota Jota at the link below:

https://vimeo.com/171033419