The Women's Work Issue Women's Work. Pen and Brush. 2019 | Page 12

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The Art and Activism of
Women’s Work
By Grace Aneiza Ali, Curator
Introduction
For many of us, our first impression of
women’s work is planted by the women
in our intimate lives who loved, raised,
and sacrificed for us—our mothers and
grandmothers, sisters and aunts, teachers,
mentors and spiritual leaders, and all of their
designated surrogates and stand-ins who have
shaped the trajectory of our lives. What they
model, is that at the heart of women’s work,
is an ethos of service. For that reason, and
countless others, women’s work is honorable
work, always.
The exhibition Women’s Work: Art &
Activism in the 21 st Century takes as its point
of anti-departure, so to speak, the Oxford
Dictionary ’s definition that defines, or
perhaps more accurately confines, women’s
work to: “Work traditionally and historically
undertaken by women, especially tasks of a
domestic nature such as cooking, needlework,
and child rearing.”
Yes, despite the last century of
groundbreaking, audacious change and
catalysts, the dictionary still hasn’t caught up
to us. It is absolutely important to note that
the exhibition is not a dismissal, critique,
or trivializing of this definition. Instead, it
is grounded in the belief that all women’s
work, within the realm of the domestic and
beyond, is valuable and of value. However, it
acknowledges that the definition has rightly
evolved, and must continue to do so, across
centuries and geographies.
Sama Alshaibi, Marjana, from the project Carry Over, 2018, gumoil on cotton rag, 20.5 x 13.75 inches.
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Indeed the five artists gathered in Women’s
Work—Sama Alshaibi, María Magdalena
Campos-Pons, Suchitra Mattai, Miora
Rajaonary, and Ming Smith—each subscribe
to their own definitions of the term in
theory and in practice. Those definitions
are shaped by their self-awareness, political
consciousness, and equally important,
their vast global and cultural roots in Cuba,
Guyana, Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Madagascar,
South Africa, United States, and throughout
the Caribbean, Indian, and African Diasporas.
Women’s Work presents women who continue
to expand the definition of women’s work
and expose its complexity, nuance, and
ever-evolving nature. In 2017, many of us
marched in unison with over four million
people across the country at the Women’s
March, the largest single-day demonstration
in recorded U.S. history. What we heard in
the language of protest, from the speakers
on the stage to the masses in attendance,
was a collective reminder that women’s work
is rooted in activism, in justice, in service,
and in resistance. In tandem, Women’s Work
is a provocation for us to reclaim the term
“women’s work” and make space for its
varied reinventions and future possibilities.
Through the dynamic practices of the five
global contemporary artist-activists gathered
here, who generously lend their intelligence,
thoughtfulness, artistry, and agency in
service to something greater than themselves,
women’s work is reimagined as arts activism
in the 21st century.
Sama Alshaibi
Sama Alshaibi’s Carry Over is a meditation on