From the New Magazine article at Jersey City Independent
Wonder Women: _gaia Aims to Fix the Art World’s ‘Problem with Women’ … One Woman at a Time
By Brendan Carroll • Apr 25th, 2011 • Category: Arts, Lead Story
The women of _gaia’s most recent Wonder Women residency (All photos: Steve Gold)
This story also appears in the Spring 2011 issue of NEW magazine.
More than half of artists working today in the United States are women. Despite these large numbers, many female artists live on the fringe, eking out an existence in relative obscurity. The hallmarks of art world booty – museum retrospectives, solo exhibitions in blue-chip galleries, private and public commissions – go mostly to men, not women.
Just how bad is it for women in the art world?
According to an encyclopedic demographic and employment study released in 2008 by the National Endowment of the Arts:
* 5 percent of works in museums are by women.
* 17 percent of works in galleries are by women.
* 30 percent of Guggenheim grants go to women.
* 33 percent of art-faculty members are women.
* Women artists’ income is 30 percent that of the income of men.
This does not sit well with Newark native and Downtown Jersey City resident Doris Caçoilo (seen standing at right). So in 2002, she and longtime friend Amie Figueiredo brought together a group of women to begin organizing around women’s issues, activism and art. They named their organization _gaia, after the Greek goddess of Earth.
“The art world has a problem with women,” Caçoilo says. “We need to fix this.”
©Melissa MacAlpin, ...and all of this is metaphor, Love stories from the NYTimes
_gaia works to fix this through a number of avenues. It operates as a collective of member artists and activists who “actively promote and support the work of local women artists,” as the group’s statement reads. _gaia also puts together intensive artist residencies each year, runs a studio space for its members, hosts monthly art openings, and partners with other local groups for shows and projects.
Read the entire article here!
