Dear Reader,
This Women’s issue is not our first, but we welcome any opportunity to celebrate women artists, curators and dealers. Normally our November/December issue is our Interview issue, but in light of the recent overturn of Roe v. Wade, we made the decision to exclusively profile and interview women in the arts. As with all our themed issues—our unique Artillery modus operandi—I personally worry about who we might have left out. (Ah, the stress of being an editor.) So, bear in mind, we simply cannot cover every worthy female artist, but this time around we wanted to champion the particular women featured in this issue.
One woman who did not make it into this issue that I would like to personally celebrate and acknowledge is Diane Arbus. I was recently in New York and had the opportunity to see the rare showing of all of Arbus’ original photographs from her famous Aperture book and MoMA 1972 retrospective at the David Zwirner Gallery in Chelsea. We’ve all seen the photos in the book, and a smattering of those images in museums, but the complete series hung with deft curation was a sight to behold. I thought of this artist—a privileged white woman, for sure—going around the streets of Manhattan in the 1960s with her Rolleiflex camera in hand, asking passersby if she could take their photograph. Her confidence and unabashed behavior must be applauded. In a way she was rebelling against her wealthy upbringing by turning the spotlight on people that were not part of her world. Some might call it exploitation, but I hardly see it that way at all.
She was an inspiration to me as an artist, as I’m sure she still is for many women artists. One thing I always remember, from the excellent biography by Patricia Bosworth, was how Arbus told her students to go out and take a picture of what they most feared. As a teacher I followed her lead, and as an artist myself I listened to this daring but sage advice. By receiving trust from the people she photographed, she bared her own soul in those images. How in the world did she manage to get invited to the giant’s home to take a family portrait? How did she get those twins to confront the camera, motionless? How did she get that perfect moment of an infant with tears streaming down her face?
There will only be one Diane Arbus. She was a trailblazer with a message. Isn’t that what art is all about? Many of the artists we feature in this issue follow their heart just as Arbus did. Michele Pred works with women’s issues such as abortion rights; Calida Rawles studies the complexity of being a Black woman; Astra
Huimeng Wang explores the Western world’s fictions from the perspective of her native China; and Kristin Bedford photographs the subculture of Latina women and lowriders with as much empathy and compassion as
Arbus brought to the streets of New York. Her cover photo aptly exemplifies this and speaks to a world full of women with a most important message. The Latina’s tattoo No Soy De Ti, translates to “I Don’t Belong To You.” I think that says it all.
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