The Whitworth gallery celebrates women artists in revolt at a time of cultural revolution in the UK

A tour of the Tate Britain’s exhibition “Women in revolt! Art activism in the UK 1970-1990” concludes at the Whitworth Gallery in Manchester on the 1st of June. It has been shown previously in London and Edinburgh to much acclaim. Five years in the making by its curator, Linsey Young, this is the Tate’s first exhibition which surveys feminist art with serious intent to explain the context of the works on display and the social influences that inspired them. It is on a scale never seen before in a mainstream institution. 

 The exhibition shows works of art produced by over 90 women artists and collectives from 1970 to 1990, a period of significant social, political and cultural change in the UK.

The exhibition shows works of art produced by over 90 women artists and collectives from 1970 to 1990, a period of significant social, political and cultural change in the UK. This period in women’s art history has been largely ignored previously by art institutions. Here, by placing the artworks in chronological order we can follow parallel societal changes affecting women at the time as depicted in the subject matter of each piece. It is a manifestation of social history through art as produced by women as never seen before in one space.

Groups of the exhibits are set out in rooms, each dedicated to different themes: maternal and domestic experiences, LGBTQ+ activism, racism, the peace movement, and independent music. Unusually the majority of the works came from the artists themselves, while the remainder were loaned by archive collections such as the Feminist Library in Peckham, Glasgow Women’s Library and the Bishopsgate Institute and many more.

In the 1970’s and 1980’s a new wave of feminism erupted in response to continual injustices which in effect labelled women as second class citizens.

In the 1970’s and 1980’s a new wave of feminism erupted in response to continual injustices which in effect labelled women as second class citizens. In the early 1970’s there was no statutory maternal rights for women or sex discrimination legislation. No right to equal pay. A woman had to have permission from her husband to open her own bank account.

In response, to illustrate these injustices, women used a range of media such as painting, photography, film and performance to reflect their own experiences of their lives and society. Their artwork was on a small scale out of necessity because they were mostly made at home, using materials close at hand. Hence there is a low budget diy feel to this art.

The art here is shocking, crude in its execution, humorous with many words and images. 

The art here is shocking, crude in its execution, humorous with many words and images.  All are powerful and provocative works. There are parody images and performances in which women attempt to claim agency over their own bodies. There are many facts about women’s bodies. Each piece of art is unique and so the collection refuses to define what feminist art is, because there is no one definition.

Examples are Alex Hunter’s “The Marxist’s Wife (still does the housework) depicting through twenty prints a woman’s hand attempting to clean the face of Karl Marx,  Maureen Scott’s intense painting of “Mother and Child at breaking Point,” with a mother holding a howling infant and Susan Hillier’s documentation of her own pregnancy “Ten Months” charting the progress of her pregnancy through a series of grainy photos.

The subject matter of this exhibition is still as pertinent today as it was then in those decades years ago. Legislation may have been passed since to make society more equal but, in reality, there is still inequality in many aspects of life for women: inequality in pay, a housing crisis, lack of provision of childcare, inequality in health care and women still bear the burden of labour. As a consequence, women are still in revolt.

“Women in revolt! Art activism in the UK 1970-1990” is on at the Whitworth Gallery, Manchester until the 1st of June.