The Feminine Agenda: A Group Exhibition

Over the course of mere decades, The Feminine Agenda has changed all over the world. Progressing through areas of life since the dawn of the 20th Century, Women have been fighting for some of the most basic rights, including the right to vote, financial freedom, and bodily autonomy to name just a small fraction. The speed of technology and the deep enrichment of further education has taught women to explore different ways of life and new methods of thought at a much younger age. Current events and civil issues plaguing America has brought new facets of these issues to marginalized groups of people, and creativity has become an outlet for Revolution and a way to broadcast a message of change. 

Womenswork.Art will be exploring the ever-changing theme of The Feminine Agenda, as part of our community involvement with We Rise: Poughkeepsie. 

The exhibition will be juried by Artist Ana Maria Farina. (For more about Ana and her work, please visit: https://www.anamafarina.com/) 

Juror Bio: "Ana Maria is a Brazilian artist and educator based in New York. She received her masters degree in Art and Art Education from Columbia University in 2016, and in 2018 she was awarded a fellowship to the New York Foundation for the Arts Immigrant Artist Mentoring Program. Most recently, she received a scholarship to attend the MFA program at SUNY New Paltz, where she is also the Visiting Artist Director and the president of the Student Art Alliance.
As both an artist and an educator, Ana is interested in experimentation, experiences of release and constraint, expansion and collapse. Her work investigates themes of hysteria and repression of the feminine, as well as the body and identity through the lens of feminist theory and psychoanalysis. Lately, Ana has been exploring the materiality of fibers and textiles, creating sculptural paintings that visually speak what Elaine Showalter called a “feminine protolanguage.”

About We Rise: Poughkeepsie-  “The project is a collaboration of city art galleries, organizations, artists and activists to celebrate the  he 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, giving women in the United States the right to vote. 

This centennial offers an opportunity to commemorate a milestone in our democracy and to examine and celebrate the power of the vote and of raising our voices in this election year. We will look at the intertwined and often fraught relationships between the women’s suffrage movement, abolition and black voting rights and talk with contemporary female artists about how they are using their voices in the context of community and power.

Art exhibits, movie screenings, performances, panel discussions and lectures, trivia night and surprise events are planned.  There will be something for everyone, so mark your calendars and join us in person or virtually.

All the events and exhibits will be held in downtown Poughkeepsie, NY from Sept 4 to Sept 19; exhibit dates vary by venue.  In response to evolving local health and business guidelines, some events may become virtual or hybrid events.”