Feminist film theory is a theoretical film criticism derived from feminist politics and feminist theory influenced by second-wave feminism and brought about around the 1970s in the United States. With the advancements in film throughout the years feminist film theory has developed and changed to analyse the current ways of film and also go back to analyse films past. Feminists have many approaches to cinema analysis, regarding the film elements analyzed and their theoretical underpinnings.
Film theory is a set of scholarly approaches within the academic discipline of film or cinema studies that began in the 1920s by questioning the formal essential attributes of motion pictures; and that now provides conceptual frameworks for understanding film's relationship to reality, the other arts, individual viewers, and society at large. Film theory is not to be confused with general film criticism, or film history, though these three disciplines interrelate.
Gender studies is an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to analysing gender identity and gendered representation. Gender studies originated in the field of women's studies, concerning women, feminism, gender, and politics. The field now overlaps with queer studies and men's studies. Its rise to prominence, especially in Western universities after 1990, coincided with the rise of deconstruction.
Postmodern art is a body of art movements that sought to contradict some aspects of modernism or some aspects that emerged or developed in its aftermath. In general, movements such as intermedia, installation art, conceptual art and multimedia, particularly involving video are described as postmodern.
Écriture féminine, or "women's writing", is a term coined by French feminist and literary theorist Hélène Cixous in her 1975 essay "The Laugh of the Medusa". Cixous aimed to establish a genre of literary writing that deviates from traditional masculine styles of writing, one which examines the relationship between the cultural and psychological inscription of the female body and female difference in language and text. This strand of feminist literary theory originated in France in the early 1970s through the works of Cixous and other theorists including Luce Irigaray, Chantal Chawaf, Catherine Clément and Julia Kristeva, and has subsequently been expanded upon by writers such as psychoanalytic theorist Bracha Ettinger. who emerged in this field in the early 1990s,
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, fictional, or philosophical discourse. It aims to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines women's and men's social roles, experiences, interests, chores, and feminist politics in a variety of fields, such as anthropology and sociology, communication, media studies, psychoanalysis, political theory, home economics, literature, education, and philosophy.
Feminist art is a category of art associated with the late 1960s and 1970s feminist movement. Feminist art highlights the societal and political differences women experience in their lives. The hopeful gain from this form of art is to bring a positive and understanding change to the world, in hope to lead to equality or liberation. Media used range from traditional art forms such as painting to more unorthodox methods such as performance art, conceptual art, body art, craftivism, video, film, and fiber art. Feminist art has served as an innovative driving force towards expanding the definition of art through the incorporation of new media and a new perspective.
Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger is an Israeli artist, writer, psychoanalyst and philosopher, living and working in Paris and Tel Aviv. She is a feminist theorist and artist in contemporary New European Painting who invented the concept of the Matrixial Gaze and related concepts. Ettinger is a professor at European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland and at GCAS, Dublin. In 2023, she was part of the Finding Committee for the Artistic Director of Documenta’s 2027 edition. She later resigned from the committee after requesting a pause due to the Israel-Hamas War.
Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today, art history examines broader aspects of visual culture, including the various visual and conceptual outcomes related to an ever-evolving definition of art. Art history encompasses the study of objects created by different cultures around the world and throughout history that convey meaning, importance or serve usefulness primarily through visual representations.
New European Painting emerged in the 1980s and reached a critical point of major distinction and influence in the 1990s with painters like Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, Georg Baselitz, Anselm Kiefer and Bracha L. Ettinger whose paintings have established and continue to create a new dialogue between the historical archive, American Abstraction and figuration. The major new European painters of this era show strong engagements with painful personal and general history, as well as shared history; its memory and its oblivion; and with life under the shadow of World War II, utilizing research in new and old materials, photography and oil painting.
Rozsika Parker was a British psychotherapist, art historian and writer and a feminist.
Feminist ethics is an approach to ethics that builds on the belief that traditionally ethical theorizing has undervalued and/or underappreciated women's moral experience, which is largely male-dominated, and it therefore chooses to reimagine ethics through a holistic feminist approach to transform it.
The feminist art movement refers to the efforts and accomplishments of feminists internationally to produce art that reflects women's lives and experiences, as well as to change the foundation for the production and perception of contemporary art. It also seeks to bring more visibility to women within art history and art practice. The movement challenges the traditional hierarchy of arts over crafts, which views hard sculpture and painting as superior to the narrowly perceived 'women's work' of arts and crafts such as weaving, sewing, quilting and ceramics. Women artists have overturned the traditional view by, for example, using unconventional materials in soft sculptures, new techniques such as stuffing, hanging and draping, and for new purposes such as telling stories of their own life experiences. The objectives of the feminist art movement are thus to deconstruct the traditional hierarchies, represent women more fairly and to give more meaning to art. It helps construct a role for those who wish to challenge the mainstream narrative of the art world. Corresponding with general developments within feminism, and often including such self-organizing tactics as the consciousness-raising group, the movement began in the 1960s and flourished throughout the 1970s as an outgrowth of the so-called second wave of feminism. It has been called "the most influential international movement of any during the postwar period."
Feminist art criticism emerged in the 1970s from the wider feminist movement as the critical examination of both visual representations of women in art and art produced by women. It continues to be a major field of art criticism.
Fred Lionel Orton is an English art historian. His initial training was at Coventry College of Art in painting as a Dip.A,D student. He extended his experience in the History and Development of Art initially at the Courtauld Institute in London and then professionally as a scholar of art history and art theory at the University of Leeds.
Judy Clark is a British artist. She works in many media, including painting, photography, performance, sculptural media, and print processes.
Lisa E. Bloom is an American cultural critic, educator and feminist art historian specializing in polar studies, contemporary art, environmental art, history of photography, visual culture and film studies and is known for her books and essay contributions to these areas.
Hilary Robinson is a British academic and art theorist. She is Professor of Feminism, Art, and Theory at Loughborough University's School of Social Sciences and Humanities. She was Dean of the School of Art and Design and a professor at Middlesex University, and previously served as Dean of the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research focuses on the history, theory, and practice of feminist art.
Portrait of Charlotte du Val d'Ognes is an 1801 painting attributed to Marie-Denise Villers. It is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The painting was first acquired by the museum in 1922 and attributed to Jacques Louis David. Later, the painting was attributed to Constance Marie Charpentier and finally to Villers.
Rosemary Betterton is an English feminist art historian, writer, and educator. She is recognized for her work in the field of Contemporary Art, particularly her inquiries into women's art practices.
