The Women Artists' Cooperative Space as a Site for Social Change

This article explores a series of programming and exhibitions implemented by Artemisia Gallery in Chicago from 1973 to 1979, which prepared women artists to enter the professional workforce equipped with feminist pedagogy to promote social justice for women in the art world. ¹ Each event was sponsored by the Artemisia Fund, which was founded after the gallery was incorporated in 1973, to foster a national educational dialogue regarding the history of women artists, as well as the social, economic, and political concerns they faced (Poe, 1979). The Fund identified the problems that barred women from attaining a professional identity, used a separatist space as a site to tackle those issues, and employed strategies to reach beyond the immediate audience of its membership. ² To investigate the impact of the Artemisia Fund, four programs will be examined: “Economic Structures of the Art World,” “Feminist Art Workers,” “Feminist Education: Method and Techniques,” and the exhibition “Both Sides Now.”