First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Women have been making art for centuries, yet their work has been seen as secondary or has gone unrecognized altogether. Women Making Art asks why this is so, and what it would take for us to realize the extent of women's extraordinary contribution to the arts. Marsha Meskimmon mobilizes contemporary feminist thinking to reconsider how and why women have made art. She examines work by a wide range of women artists from different cultures and historical periods, including Rebecca Horn, Rachel Whiteread, Shirin Neshat and Maya Lin, emphasizing the diversity of women's art and the importance of differences between women.

"In response to the poor representation of women in art galleries and museums, Philadelphia-based collector Linda Lee Alter decided in the 1980s to focus on art by women. The result, now at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, is an extraordinarily diverse and powerful collection of nearly 500 objects by some of the most influential female artists of the past 50 years. Emphasizing contemporary living artists, but including major works by Louise Bourgeois, Elizabeth Catlett, Alice Neel, Louise Nevelson, and others, Alter formed her collection with the intent of giving it to a public institution in order to make women artists more visible. This gorgeously illustrated volume celebrates the collection and its legacy by bringing together leading scholars of feminism, and modern and contemporary art to discuss how the artists in Alter's collection saw and transformed the world. Among the essays are discussions of the impact of feminism in Chicago, Philadelphia and the San Francisco Bay area; self-portraiture by women in the 1970s and 1980s; the legacy of Elizabeth Catlett on younger African American artists; collaborative practice among women; an interview with Linda Lee Alter; and an appreciation by artist Diane Burko." -- Publisher's description.

"Do look after my music!" Irene Wienawska Polowski exclaimed before her death in 1932. And from the urgency of that sentiment the authors here have taken their cue to reveal and "look after" the previously neglected contributions of women throughout the history of Western art music. The first work of its kind, Women Making Music presents biographies of outstanding performers and composers, as well as analyses of women musicians as a class, and provides examples of music from all periods including medieval chant, Renaissance song, Baroque opera, German lieder, and twentieth-century composition. Unlike most standard historical surveys, the book not only sheds light upon the musical achievements of women, it also illuminates the historical contexts that shaped and defined those achievements.

When women were admitted to the Royal Academy Schools in 1860, female art students gained a foothold in the most conservative art institution in England. The Royal Female College of Art, the South Kensington Schools and the Slade School of Fine Art also produced increasing numbers of women artists. Their entry into a male-dominated art world altered the perspective of other artists and the public. They came from disparate levels of society--Princess Louise, the fourth daughter of Queen Victoria, studied sculpture at the National Art Training School--yet they all shared ambition, talent and courage. Analyzing their education and careers, this book argues that the women who attended the art schools during the 1860s and 1870s--including Kate Greenaway, Elizabeth Butler, Helen Allingham, Evelyn De Morgan and Henrietta Rae--produced work that would accommodate yet subtly challenge the orthodoxies of the fine art establishment. Without their contributions, Victorian art would be not simply the poorer but hardly recognizable to us today.

This interdisciplinary book examines the work of several female artists since 1960 in the areas of dance, music, installation, photography, architecture, poetry, literature, theater, film, and performance art. Each chapter is primarily devoted to an important work by a single artist, seen within its historical context, and with particular attention to how each artist incorporated gender issues or feminist thought into her respective art form. Laurie Anderson, Gwendolyn Brooks, Jane Campion, Judy Chicago, Zaha Hadid, Pauline Oliveros, Yvonne Rainer, Cindy Sherman, Amy Tan, and Paula Vogel have each made groundbreaking contributions to their fields. As a group, they represent a tremendous diversity of approaches to art making: from accessible to opaque, from overtly feminist to apolitical, from emotive to cool, from controversial to mainstream.

Five centuries of fascinating female creativity presented in more than 400 compelling artworks and one comprehensive volume The most extensive fully illustrated book of women artists ever published, Great Women Artists reflects an era where art made by women is more prominent than ever. In museums, galleries, and the art market, previously overlooked female artists, past and present, are now gaining recognition and value. Featuring more than 400 artists from more than 50 countries and spanning 500 years of creativity, each artist is represented here by a key artwork and short text. This essential volume reveals a parallel yet equally engaging history of art for an age that champions a greater diversity of voices. "Real changes are upon us, and today one can reel off the names of a number of first-rate women artists. Nevertheless, women are just getting started."—The New Yorker