Women in Museums - International Women's Day!

It’s no surprise that the demographics of museum workers are as biased as those in other industries. Museum directors are usually men, men who are substantially better paid than their female counterparts. The bigger = more important the museum, the more likely the director is to be male. This is, need I say, NOT because men can do this work better than women. Rather, women are consistently underestimated (even by themselves!) in professional terms compared to men. And it doesn’t help for them to act more like men either.

One of my favorite museum directors is Kaywin Feldman of the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. She is a high-powered, outspoken advocate for equality of gender and race in society today, starting with her own museum.

The book Women in the Museum (right) examines the museum structures that need to be revised in order for museums to be an equal working place for women. What great cover art!

Art museums may be prestigious institutions of knowledge, but they are deeply flawed. In the last few years, numerous studies have shown that women are underrepresented in both art museum collections and operations. Collections are dominated by white male artists. One recent sweeping study showed that only 11% of the acquisitions in American art museums over the past decade represented work by women. (The National Museum of Women in the Arts has lots more statistics too!) This is problematic because it reifies the idea that only men can be gifted artists and “geniuses.” Art museums make the art canon. And this canon is damaging to women.

One of the most visible campaigns about this inequality was launched early on by the Gorilla Girls and their poster, “Do Women Have To Be Naked To Get Into the Met. Museum?” They continue their advocacy to the present day – see an interview at left.

Museums that showcase women help women’s contributions to society to be recognized in a way proportionate to men’s contributions. The International Association of Women’s Museums helps coordinate, advertise, and inspire worldwide museums about women. Checking out their map, I see that the definition of museum is quite broad: The “women’s museum of Berlin” is not a typical museum but an association of women artists. So not all the pins on the map can be understood as the institutions one might expect.

The National Women’s History Museum is a huge online learning institution and is lobbying for a brick-and-mortar museum in Washington DC. Their online exhibitions and lesson plans (including videos, right) offer a taste of the many topics the museum irl could address. A page of links to related projects could keep me busy for hours…

Several inspiring projects about women as museum visitors have come up in recent years.

• One of my all-time favorites is Art Activist Barbie, making Barbie the commentator on the male-driven art industry.
• Nicole Tersinger’s fantastic meme series of paintings of women being mansplained to. It’s on Twitter and in book and web format.
• Some great accounts to follow on Instagram make women in museums front + center: @browngirlcurator @artherstorynotes @girlsinmuseums
• I just found out about the film Girls | Museum by Shelly Silver. I hope to find a way to watch it soon – I’ll report back!