Six Pioneering Feminist Artists Showing in New York

Several exhibitions simultaneously showcasing the work of second-generation feminist artists — namely Joyce Kozloff, Martha Wilson, Joan Semmel, Judith Bernstein,Joan Snyder, and Ida Applebroog. These six women have been continuously producing stellar work since the 1960s, and it’s not only fabulous that they’re receiving the attention they so deserve, but each exhibit is a tremendous visual treat as well. More

Ida Applebroog, studio shot of ‘Ethics of Desire’ (2015) (© Ida Applebroog, courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth)

Ida Applebroog, “Ethics of Desire” (2013), ultrachrome ink on mylar, 3 panels, 59 3/4 x 128 3/8 in (© Ida Applebroog, courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth)

Born in Bronx, NY, Ida Applebroog attended NY State Institute of Applied Arts and Sciences (1949). She moved to Chicago in 1956, later attending the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1968). After relocating to San Diego, California she exhibited in "Invisible/Visible" at Long Beach Art Museum, 1972. In 1973 she taught at the University of California in San Diego before returning to NY. Starting in 1977 she circulated a series of self-published books through the mail, and joined Heresies/A Feminist Journal on Art and Politics. In 1981 she showed "Applebroog: Silent Stagings", her first exhibition at Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, NY, More

Joyce Kozloff, “The Tempest” (2014), mixed media on panel, 120 x 120 in (© Joyce Kozloff, courtesy the artist and DC Moore Gallery)

Joyce Kozloff, “Social Studies: Palestine” (2013), collage, digital archival inkjet print, 36 x 47 in (© Joyce Kozloff, courtesy the artist and DC Moore Gallery)

Throughout my career, I have tried to fuse a love for widespread artistic traditions with an activist temperament. Beginning in 1970, energized by my participation in the feminist art movement in Los Angeles and New York, I became a founding member of the Heresies publishing collective and an originating figure of the Pattern and Decoration movement. My colleagues and I were exploring the applied and decorative arts, especially visual cultures of the nonwestern world, as source and inspiration. More

Joan Semmel, “Erotic Yellow” (1973), oil on canvas, 72 x 72 in (courtesy the artist and Alexander Gray Associates, New York, © 2015 Joan Semmel / Artist Rights Society [ARS], New York)

Joan Semmel, “Centered” (2002), oil on canvas, 48 x 53 in (courtesy the artist and Alexander Gray Associates, New York, © 2015 Joan Semmel / Artist Rights Society [ARS], New York)

Joan Semmel (born October 19, 1932, New York City) is an American feminist painter, professor, and writer. She is best known for painting large scale, realistic nudes of her own body as seen from her perspective looking down. More

Judith Bernstein, “Voyeur” (2015), oil on Canvas, 84 x 84 in (© Judith Bernstein, courtesy the artist and Mary Boone Gallery)

Judith Bernstein, “Cuntfaces” (2015), oil on canvas, 84 x 84 in (© Judith Bernstein, courtesy the artist and Mary Boone Gallery) 

Judith Bernstein (born 1942) is a feminist artist best known for her erotic drawings and graffiti art. During the beginning of the feminist art movement, Bernstein was a founding member of the cooperative feminist A.I.R. Gallery in New York. She has also been involved in the Guerilla Girls, Art Workers' Coalition, and Fight Censorship Group. Her work is in the Museum of Modern Art's permanent collection. More

Joan Snyder, “Lay of the Land” (2014), oil, acrylic, dirt, paper, pastel on linen, 60 x 84 in (© Joan Snyder, courtesy the artist)

Joan Snyder, “Peace Poster” (1971), painting on paper, 24 x 32 in (© Joan Snyder, courtesy the artist)

Born April 16, 1940, in Highland Park, NJ, Joan Snyder received her A.B. from Douglass College, New Brunswick, NJ, in 1962 and her M.F.A. from Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, in 1966. Joan Snyder was a recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1974, a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship in 1983. In 2007, Snyder received a MacArthur Fellowship. She currently lives in Brooklyn and Woodstock, NY. More

Martha Wilson, Mona/Martha/Marge, 2009, pigmented ink print on canvas (Courtesy of PPOW Gallery)

Martha Wilson, “Tipper Gore’s Advice for the 90s” (1994), photostat, 60 x 36 in each (© Martha Wilson, courtesy the artist and PPOW Gallery

Martha Wilson (b. 1947) is a pioneering feminist artist and gallery director, who over the past four decades created innovative photographic and video works that explore her female subjectivity through role-playing, costume transformations, and “invasions” of other people’s personae. More