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My new friend @BarbieReports has been filling my timeline with complaints that I didn& #39;t put enough women artists into my Sunday Times poster. Mea culpa. It& #39;s a fair point. As partial recompense, here are 10 women artists who should have been there. Starting with the obvious...
Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010). There& #39;s no doubt that Bourgeois changed the game. Her edgy surrealist sculptures made a beeline for the nerve ends, played with your instincts, and turned being old into a good thing. Here& #39;s what happened when I met here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2mx1gZqh1E">https://www.youtube.com/watch...
Dorothea Tanning (1910-2012). Tanning was the best of the female surrealists. Much better than her overrated lover, Max Ernst. Her Tate show last year was a revelation. The early dream paintings were unsettling and psychologically charged. The late sculptures were brilliant.
Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750). You can always spot a Rachel Ruysch. No still-life painter of the Dutch Golden Age sounds a darker note than her. The early & #39;forest floor& #39; pictures are especially doomy. Everything withering and dying. Things get brighter later on. But not much.
Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun (1755-1842). Although she& #39;s best known for her portraits of Marie Antointette - especially the casual one of the queen looking like a shepherdess -Vigee-Lebrun was also a pioneering self-portraitist: Cindy Sherman waiting to happen! Artist of many faces.
Katarzyna Kobro (1898-1951). Obviously I& #39;m biased, but I adore and respect the Polish constructivism of Katarzyna Kobro. What& #39;s particularly impressive is that she was so hard core. No wavering. No softening. Just the unbreakable truth of a universal geometry. Dziękuję Katarzyno.
Paula Rego (b.1935). Britain& #39;s greatest living artist? Or Portugal& #39;s greatest living artist? Either way, Rego is the queen of an edgy and sucking magic realism. What kind of a mind comes up with the Dog Woman?! Heavens what a sure touch she has with those pastels of hers.
Yoko Ono (b. 1933). Yes, yes, I know Yoko Ono was included in my poster, but I work on the principle that you cannot have too much Yoko! What a courageous artist and magnificent human being. Love her edgy performances. Love her conceptual games. Love her simple truths.
Maria Lassnig (1919-2014). How did I miss out Lassnig in my poster?! Ridiculous! Few artists have genuinely stopped me in my tracks, but that& #39;s what happened when I first encountered Lassnig. Stop. Gawp. Adore. It& #39;s the directness that gets you. The weird colours. The bravery.
Gwen John (1876-1939). While she was alive, poor Gwen John had the misfortune to be outshone by her brother Augustus John and her lover Rodin. It& #39;s now clear she was better than both of them. Whenever I see her work I feel I can hear a clock ticking. Pale, faded, afternoon art.
Varvara Stepanova (1894-1958). Now you& #39;re talking. The brilliant Russian constructivist Varvara Stepanova designed some of the best posters of the early Soviet era. So exciting visually. She also did a great line in sportswear. I wish my team, Reading FC, had outfits like these!
