Re-Evaluations in Feminism and Contemporary Art

It could be said all new research contains a “re-evaluation” of past work but these two volumes attempt a re-evaluation of feminist research in contemporary art as it has developed over the last 50 years in relation to different local/global dynamics and/or about certain artists, artworks or exhibitions. Feminism(s) aim was to interrogate existing histories and provide significant corrections to what constitutes “history”. The two volumes explore some of the ways feminism(s)’ challenges have changed museums’ curatorial practices, critical writing and art history and how feminism itself has been transformed over time and its presence in many locations. Feminism’s absence from the stories told today about the recent past and present of contemporary art represents a starting point for these essays to explore the different strategies that have been attempted in cultural and political terms and to offer fresh assessments. Their re-evaluation of artists, artworks and exhibitions goes beyond questions of reputation or recognition, to embrace questions about identifying issues in feminist research, engaging in collective work and re-examining the personal in relation to politics/aesthetics. These volumes include different voices and perspectives on feminism and contemporary art from many parts of the world by academics, critics, artists, curators and researchers.
Volume 1 has three sections that each address local and transnational issues in interpretations of feminism and amongst exhibiting artists through considering local/global dynamics and/or national frameworks (section 1); feminist cultural politics within exhibitions and writing exhibition histories (section 2) and within histories of conflicts in different local/national situations (section 3). The writers come from North Macedonia, UK, Iran, USA, China, Poland, Austria, The Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Ukraine, Latin America and Latvia – and their work engages work undertaken in Japan, Thailand, France, Vietnam, Mexico, Argentina and Brazil.

List of Figures
Acknowledgements
Katy Deepwell
Introduction: Why Re-Evaluation Now for Feminism and Contemporary Art?
Katy Deepwell

Section 1: Local/Global Feminisms and Histories
Chapter 1
Macrohistories and Feminist Microhistories: Women Artists as Archivists of Solidarity and Intersectionality
Suzana Milevska
Chapter 2
Feminisms, Contemporary Art and World-Systems Theories
Katy Deepwell
Chapter 3
A Field of ‘Anotherness’
Maria Kheirkhah
Chapter 4
Imaginary Maps: Writing Feminist Solidarities Beyond the Centre
Kimberly Lamm
Chapter 5
Feminine-ism and Feminism: Two Approaches to Chinese Contemporary Feminist Art
Qingyu Shen
Chapter 6
Exercises in Post-Socialist Feminist Art History: Historicizing Collective Artistic Labour during Socialism
Karolina Majewska-Güde

Section 2: Re-evaluations of Exhibitions
Chapter 7
Performing Organizational Feminism: VALIE EXPORT and Silvia Eiblmayr’s Kunst mit Eigen-Sinn (1985)
Lisa Moravec
Chapter 8
Conceptual Clothing (1986–1988): A New Category?
Fran Cottell
Chapter 9
Catchup and Affinity in Women’s Exhibitions: Re-evaluating the Feminaissance Links between Global Feminisms and Another Energy
Valeria Mari
Chapter 10
The Broken Genealogy of Feminist Art History: The Gallery of the District Board of the Women’s League (1967–1980) in Socialist Poland
Wiktoria Szczupacka
Chapter 11
The Separatist Issue in the 1980s Italian Art System
Angela Maderna
Chapter 12
Words Weaving Worlds. Feminist and Queer Curating in Contemporary Art in 1990s Spain
Pedro Merchán Mateos

Section 3: Histories of Conflicts, Situations and Countries
Chapter 13
Woman’s Body as a Site of Struggle and Land as a Struggling Body: Contemporary Ukrainian Women Artists
Oksana Briukhovetska
Chapter 14
The Collereuses and Social Protests in Feminist Art in Latin America after the 1990s
Gabriela Traple Wieczorek
Chapter 15
It’s Your Fault! Feminist Art, Foodwork and the Postsocialist Kitchen
Jana Kukaine
Chapter 16
(Re)-Evaluating Artistic Norms and Temporalities: Feminist and Disability Perspectives in Contemporary Practice
Virginia Marano
Chapter 17
“The Spectacle is Vulnerable”: On the Iconoclastic Origins of Feminist Art Theory
Alexandra Kokoli

About the Authors
Index

Katy Deepwell is an art critic based in London. She was a Global Dis:Connect Fellow, Kate Hamburger Kolleg, Munich (Oct 2025-March 2026) and Professor of Contemporary Art, Theory and Criticism at Middlesex University (2013-Feb 2025). She is the founder and editor of KT press (started 1998 - present) and 'n.paradoxa: international feminist art journal' (1998-2017). Recent books include: 'Conversations on Art, Artworks and Feminism' (KT press, 2025); (ed) 'De-/Anti-/Post-colonial Feminisms in Contemporary Art and Textile Craft' (KT press, 2023); (ed) '50 Feminist Art Manifestos' (KT press, 2022), (ed) 'Feminist Art Activisms and Artivisms' (Valiz, 2020) and with Agata Jakubowska (co-editor) 'All Women Spaces in Europe in the Long 1970s' (Liverpool University Press, 2018).

Post-socialist feminism,neoliberalism,feminist art history,feminist art criticism,feminist curating,transnational feminisms,decolonial art history,socialist feminism,state feminism,diasporic feminism,queer postcolonial feminism,Chinese feminist art,South Eastern European feminist art,Italian women artists,Spanish feminist art,Ukrainian feminist art,Latin American feminism,women artists,VALIE EXPORT,Mujeres Creando,art activism,visual activism,socially engaged art,contemporary art,critical disability studies