Titles like the above are eyecatchers, at least for art historians who happen to be women. Since the early 1990s I was among the eager travellers to Cologne and other European cities to see solo exhibitions of Lyubov Popova (1889-1924) and other modernists. I love it to this day.
Traditionally however, museums show art works of ‘Russian’ women avant-gardists mostly in group exhibitions. As a different category, apart from their male colleagues. That is remarkable as they closely collaborated with them on the forefront of the avant-garde, having eagerly seized the moment of modernization. They were highly motivated, well-educated artists and commanded respect with distinctly original art in their own time.
Nevertheless, for almost a century, Dutch museum curators (with some exceptions) took their time to get used to the idea that women are fully fledged human beings, and their art worthy of showing and discussing. To this day, policies of inclusion appear to be necessary to embrace all, discriminate none on the basis of gender or otherwise.
In the current exhibition in Museum Arnhem, three favourites Russian and Ukrainian avant-gardistes figure among the substantial number of women artists: Alexandra Exter, Natalia Goncharova and Sonia Delaunay. They were artists pur sang, working in multiple disciplines. Some of their paintings, theatre and textile designs are included today. I hope that solo exhibitions will follow soon, showcasing their complete oeuvres in the Netherlands also, as they are highly inspirational.
The exhibition Radical. Women artists and modernism 1910-50 is on view until Jan 5. in Museum Arnhem.
Goncharova, Seraph, 1914, gouache au pochoir, 73 x 54.7 cm,
for the Liturgy Folio, 1915