Woman s Art Journal · 2005 · 98 citations · 0 references
Female ArtistsEarly 20Th-century FranceFrenchContemporary CultureVisual ArtsSocial SciencesArt CriticismFeminist ResearchGender StudiesFeminist IdentityCultural HistoryLanguage StudiesFeminist Literary TheoryArt HistoryFrench LiteratureModern WomanFeminist ScholarshipFrench CultureFeminist PerspectiveFrancophone LiteratureVisual CultureFeminist Theory20Th Century French LiteratureFeminist LiteratureFrench SocietyModernity
Early 20‑century Paris was a hub where female artists such as Colette, Tamara de Lempicka, and Sonia Delaunay challenged modernist norms, yet scholarship has largely overlooked their gender, race, class, and sexuality contributions. This volume assembles a roster of art historians and literary critics to present a nuanced portrait of what it meant to be a modern woman during the interwar period. Each essay examines the obstacles women faced and the strategies they employed to create art and build careers in early modernist Paris.
contributions of female artists to the development of literary and modernism in early 20th-century France remain poorly understood. It was during this period that a so-called began occupying urban spaces associated with the development of modern art and modernism's struggles to define subjectivities and sexualities. Whereas most studies of modernism's formal innovations and its encouragement of artistic autonomy neglect or omit necessary discussions of gender, race, class and sexual orientation, the contributors to The Modern Woman Revisited inject these perspectives into the discussion. Between the two world wars, Paris served as the setting for unparalleled freedom for expatriate as well as native-born French women, who enjoyed unprecedented access to education and opportunities to participate in public, artistic and intellectual life. Many of these women made lasting contributions to art and literature. Some of the artists discussed include: Colette; Tamara de Lempicka; Sonia Delaunay; Djuna Barnes; Augusta Savage; and Lee Miller. In this text, an internationally recognized roster of art historians, literary critics, and other scholars offers a nuanced portrait of what it meant to be a modern woman during this decisive period of modernism's development. Individual essays explore the challenges faced by women in the early decades of the 20th century, as well as the strategies these women deployed to create their art and build meaningful lives and careers. introduction underscores the importance of the contributors' efforts to engender larger questions about modernity, sexuality, race and class.