The Mood Back Home: an exhibition inspired by Womanhouse

By Laura Andre

A new exhibition at Momenta Art gallery in Brooklyn, New York addresses the challenges women face in simultaneously pursuing artistic careers, motherhood, and domestic lives. Once thought to be mutually exclusive pursuits, traditional gender roles and stereotypes about what it means to be an artist continue to suggest that women artists can't quite have it all. "The Mood Back Home", on view February 12 through March 16, 2009, disputes that notion, featuring topical work by 12 contemporary women artists.

In conceiving the exhibition, artists (and new mothers) Suzy Spence and Leslie Brack drew their inspiration from their own mothers' generation—specifically the groundbreaking 1972 exhibition/performance Womanhouse. That collaborative project, led by artists Judy Chicago and Miriam Schapiro, focused on the intersection between women's domestic and artistic lives, and took form in an abandoned Hollywood mansion, with each room representing a specific aspect of the work's theme. The most provocative of these installations included "Womb Room" by Faith Wilding, "Menstruation Bathroom" by Judy Chicago, and Robin Weltsch's "all pink-skinned" kitchen.

Many of these works were destroyed, lost or stolen following the close of Womanhouse; it is thus emblematic of the historical erasure of women's cultural contributions. While still considered a profoundly important episode in the nascent feminist art movement, Womanhouse is poorly documented and sometimes regarded as no longer pertinent to contemporary feminist experience. On the contrary, a new generation of artists, including Spence and Brack, are struck by just how relevant the ideas expressed in Womanhouse are today.

"The Mood Back Home: an exhibition inspired by Womanhouse" takes a decidedly contemporary look at the issues its predecessor brought into high relief, while also taking steps to preserve its legacy. The exhibition will feature new work and include Johanna Demetrekas's 1972 film documentary about Womanhouse. As an adjunct to the exhibition, the artists have also created a permanent Womanhouse website, providing a crucial archive of images and writings related to this important historical endeavor.

For more information, please visit participating artist Suzy Spence's personal website, www.suzyspence.com/themoodbackhome/index.html, the website created to display the original Womanhouse project, www.womanhouse.refugia.net/, and the Momenta Art Gallery's site, www.momentaart.org