Girls Teaching students how to read powerful
images promotes awareness about conditions
and circumstances that society has come to
accept, but in reality, should not allow.
Suggested Classroom Activities
1. Compare and contrast Jean-
Auguste-Dominique Ingres’ La
Grande Odalisque (1814) to
the Guerrilla Girls’ Do Women
have to be Naked to get into the
Metropolitan Museum? (1989).
What message does each image
convey? How are these messages
conveyed?
that the Guerrilla Girls formed and
decided to take action by embarrassing the art establishment. This was
accomplished by creating humorous
posters that were later put up in the
streets of New York. The posters
were an immediate sensation that
prompted discussions about difficult topics and brought attention to
discriminatory practices in the art
world.
meets this obligation without
hesitation. Teaching students how
to read such powerful images promotes awareness about conditions
and circumstances that society
has come to accept, but in reality,
should deny. Certain practices that
encourage stereotyping are often
so ingrained within our daily lives
that they are easy to overlook.
2. Ask students to watch an hour of
primetime television. Tally the
number of actresses or actors in
any given series. What role does
each person play? What physical characteristics or personality
traits does each person possess?
In what role is each character
cast? Contrast and compare
physical characteristics against
the roles played. What patterns
emerge?
The Guerrilla Girls have since
undertaken a wider range of subject
matter resulting in projects that
often incorporate a biting sense of
humor while addressing important
social and political issues. Besides
posters, the Guerrilla Girls have
published books, created billboards,
launched a Web site, designed bumper stickers, and made worldwide
public appearances.
Resource
Heywood, Ian. Interpreting Visual
Culture. New York: Routledge,
1998.
Guerilla Girls. Interview. www.gue-rillagirls.com, 1995.
3. Ask students to list the first ten
artists who come to mind. Sort
the lists by gender, age, and diversity. What are the percentages of
each category? What does this
suggest about the way we understand art history and who is considered valuable to art?
Pam Stephens is an advisory board member of SchoolArts and is coordinator of art
education at Northern Arizona University,
Flagstaff. Pamela.Stephens@nau.edu
nationaL Standard
Social Consciousness
A responsibility of the visual arts,
it has been said, is to interpret the
positives and negatives of human
existence. Guerrilla Girl art, with
its theme of social consciousness,
Students understand the visual arts
in relation to history and cultures.
Web Link
4. Discuss what issues students
notice in their daily lives. How
can art change the way society
thinks about political and social
issues? Develop individual or
class projects such as electronic
slide shows or brochures that
bring public awareness to the
issues.
