: Identify and discuss some of the ways gender is brought to the fore by two visual artists of the early second wave period

Essay length: 1500 words

Essay Question: Identify and discuss some of the ways gender is brought to the fore by two visual artists of the early second wave period. Your answer should also consider the criticism and debates surrounding their work.

What you need to read:

1) Set readings (I’ll write the name of the articles below and please research them and read them before writing the essay)), and 2) research beyond the set readings. At least two further articles or books should be consulted.

What you need to write:

Criteria of assessment

This assignment assesses:

1. your understanding of how feminist theorists have analysed literary texts, cultural artefacts, visual images and/or film for gender, sexuality and identity;

2. a critical and independent stance in relation to this material;

3. your ability to present a structured argument in relation to the material (a clear introduction with a statement of the essay’s direction, followed by paragraphs focused on specific issues, building to a conclusion that sums up the argument);

4. your ability to support your argument with detailed analysis of, and reference to, the readings.

**The essay should be informed by research beyond the set readings given for the course. At least two further articles or books should be consulted.**

1. Set readings: (have to read them all before writing the essay)

1) Cixous, Helene (1997) “Sorties: Out and out: Attacks/ways out/forays.” In Catherine Belsey and Jane Moore (Eds) The feminist reader: Essays in gender and the politics of literary criticism (2nd ed). London: Macmillan.

2) Wen, Patrick (2004) “Dirty minded girls who wrote novels full of murder: Uncertain self-difference and problematic representation in the Parker/Hulme Murder Case.” Literature Interpretation Theory, 15(3), pp. 241–252.

3) Heavenly Creatures (1994). Director Peter Jackson. 99 mins.

4) Jones, Amelia (1996) “The ‘sexual politics’ of The Dinner Party: A critical context.” In A. Jones, Sexual Politics: Judy Chicago’s “Dinner Party” in feminist art history (pp. 84–118). Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

5) Suleiman, Susan Rubin (1998) “Dialogue and double allegiance: Some contemporary women artists and the historical avant-garde.” In Whitney Chadwick, Mirror images; Women, surrealism and self-representation (pp. 129–154). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

2. Except reading the above set readings, also research beyond the set readings. At least two further articles or books should be consulted.

The followings are the lecture notes, you can have a look at them as reference:

Lecture 1

Female sensibility and central core imagery: Feminist art in the 1970s

Structure of lecture

• brief outline of the historical background for this art.

• central core imagery and early feminist art

• debate about female sensibility and essentialism

Artists’ names

• Judy Chicago

• Mary Beth Edelson

• Miriam Schapiro

• Eva Hesse

• Georgia O’Keefe

• Barbara Hepworth

• Lee Bontecou

• G. Courbet

• Marcel Duchamp

• Womanhouse student artists: Susan Frazier, Vicki Hodgetts, Robin Weltsch, Kathy Huberland, Faith Wilding

• Cabanel, Ingresp

Writers’ names

Standard Art Histories: Gombrich The Story of Art and Janson History of Art

Feminist Writers on Art from 1970s: Linda Nochlin, Lucy Lippard, Laura Mulvey, Griselda Pollock and Rosika, Parker, Lisa Tickner, Julie Ewington, Ann Stephen, Helen Grace and Janine Burke.

Feminist Writers: Shulamith Firestone, Simone de Beauvoir , Luce Irigaray.

Lecture 2

Images of the Body: Women’s Art in the 1960s, 1970s and 80 s

Artists’ names

Valie Export,

Ana Mendieta

Cindy Sherman

Vito Acconci,

Carolee Schneemann

Peter Weibel

Nancy Spero

Smithson