Dear Feminist Art Community,
I'd like to comment on the MoMA's recent conference, "The Feminist Future." Perhaps I'm stepping out of my role as humble editor for an unfunded, largely do-it-yourself art project. Perhaps I'm taking on the obvious, as art critic Jerry Saltz, among many others, has been quick to point how just how few women artists and artists of color the MoMA shows. However, I couldn't help be horrified by how the "Feminist Future" conference went down. Now granted, I wasn't even there. Why? It was in a tiny auditorium and tickets were sold out by mid-Ocotober for an event that was in January. However, a friend of mine did manage to get a ticket through a friend and attended. The New York Times remarked that there were very few women of color and very few young women there and that the whole event felt like a cozy, older feminist reunion. If this is, in fact, the feminist future, we're in trouble.
It's not that I don't think the people speaking weren't smart and have much to offer. It's the methods, really. I know so many younger people who were shut out of teh conversation and participation due to the exclusivity of the space- of course it's going to be the older panelists' friends who hear about it first. But that's not all. The exclusion of feminists of color was so glaringly obvious that I feel like it's just straight up embarassing. But I guess I can't expect white feminists to "get it" by now, despite over 25 years of critique from feminist of color and anti-racist white feminists. This IS the MoMA we're talking about here.
It also seems suspicious that the MoMA would suddenly announce this conference, detatched from any exhibition happening within their museum (true, the curator also worked on the WACK! show in Los Angeles, so there's not a total disconnect). However, when other institutions, namely the Brooklyn Museum, are poised to open an entire center dedicated to feminist art, it seems strange that the MoMA will suddenly jump to get their finger in the pie as well, mere months before other institutions.
I suppose the tone of this letter is overly bitter, because I honestly shouldn't be suprised. But we are at such a crucial moment artistically where people are actually paying attention (sort of) to feminist art and giving it (a little bit) of time that I think it's time we actually learn and put into practice the lessons garnered from the last 25 years. That is, a diversity of voices, working inter-generationally, constantly critiuqing our spaces to find the ways they are exclusive, and having those with obscene amounts of cultural capital give up a little bit of control. It's not all about the individual person and their cool, edgy career dealing with cool, edgy feminist art. Challenging the status quo isn't always cool and edgy. You won't see it in Chelsea galleries or on the walls in art institutions, so it's time to roll up our sleeves and do some real work together outside of the comfort zone of what feminist art and art theory has come to be.
So let's make the next 25 years of feminist art and activism a feminist future that could be owned by all of us toiling with these ideas and practice.
L.N.R.
