2015 2016 Season Preview
Welcome from director As we approach our 30th year, we embrace the idea that the National Museum of Women in the Arts can be a valuable public forum for talking about issues and ideas, reflecting our commitment to champion women through the arts. Because we are a cause-driven museum, the new Women, Arts, and Social Change initiative builds upon our mission of advocacy, bringing people together for face-to-face conversations that are relevant to diverse audiences today. FRESH TALK, the signature program of Women, Arts, and Social Change, poses the question, Can we change it? Artists, architects, authors, curators, designers, filmmakers, musicians, playwrights, and scholars convene with citizen advocates, business leaders, philanthropists, policy makers, scientists, and social entrepreneurs for creative conversations on conflict resolution, equity, education, the environment, health, race, and more. After each program, attendees are invited to social gatherings such as Sunday Supper, served family-style, and Catalyst, a cocktail hour with a topic and a twist. Women, Arts, and Social Change also features CULTURAL CAPITAL sessions, a platform for building community connections through collaborations with area organizations. This season, the museum presents programs in partnership with the Women s Voices Theater Festival, the Environmental Film Festival, the Washington National Opera, the Middle East Institute, Capital Fringe Festival, and the March on Washington Film Festival, among others. Located in the heart of Washington, D.C., home to think tanks, NGOs, and policy-making institutions, NMWA is the ideal place to present this steady drumbeat of socially relevant programming championing women and the arts as catalysts of change. Can we change it? Join us and together we ll see where the conversations take us, Susan Fisher Sterling Thank you We are immensely grateful to the visionary donors whose leadership gifts have made this significant new initiative a reality: Lorna Meyer Calas and Dennis Calas, the MLDauray Arts Initiative, Denise Littlefield Sobel, and the Swartz Foundation. Special thanks also go to RBC Wealth Management, presenting sponsors of FRESH TALK: Carrie Mae Weems and to Deborah G. Carstens, Stephanie Sale, and Dee Ann McIntyre for their support of the new initiative.
Can we change it? FRESH TALK, the signature program of Women, Arts, and Social Change launches on October 18 with art-world professionals and gender activists discussing the state of women in the arts today addressing the museum s core advocacy mission. On November 15, Carrie Mae Weems, who had her first major solo show at NMWA in 1993, takes the stage to talk about an artist s social responsibility. January kicks off a year of FRESH TALK programs under the theme of Change by Design featuring conversations on genderless design, art and environmental remediation, bicycles as agents of change, women pioneers in the film industry, architects as community builders, and fashion as a visual manifesto. Get Fresh! Add your voice to the conversation during Sunday Supper and Catalyst. These social experiments in conversation-building extend the program dialogue to create community and great ideas during dinner or over cocktails. Can t make it to NMWA? Programs will be live-streamed and recorded for online access shortly after each presentation at www.nmwa.org/freshtalk4change. Audiences are invited to add their voices via social media using #FreshTalk4Change.
Righting the Balance Can there be gender parity in the art world? Sunday, October 18, 2015, 3 6 p.m. Sunday Supper, 6 8 p.m. Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Patricia Arquette, and Emma Watson are just a few of the celebrities who have been talking about gender-based social justice in a highly public way. On a daily basis, it s the subject of Facebook feeds, tweets, online news postings, and blogs. Major summits empowering women are being convened, TED Talks given and books written. What does this evolving conversation mean for women in the arts who have been fighting the good fight for years and making little headway? How can we enlist new audiences as advocates for women in the arts? Righting the Balance considers the inequality that persists for women artists today and explores new pathways in the quest for gender equity. TOP ROW, LEFT-TO-RIGHT: BOTTOM ROW, LEFT-TO-RIGHT: JAMIA WILSON: PHOTO COURTESY FRESH SPEAKERS; JILLIAN STEINHAUER: PHOTO COURTESY JILLIAN STEINHAUER; SARAH DOUGLAS: PHOTO COURTESY SARAH DOUGLAS; GABRIELA PALMIERI: PHOTO COURTESY SOTHEBY S; MAURA REILLY: PHOTO BY ANDREW WATSON; MICOL HEBRON: PHOTO BY SAFI ALIA SHABAIK; GUERRILLA GIRL ALMA THOMAS WITH DEVON JONES, A YOUNG FEMINIST, 2009, PHOTO BY ANNETTE O. JONES, COURTESY ALMA THOMAS; GHADA AMER: PHOTO BY BRIAN BUCKLEY, COURTESY CHEIM & READ, NEW YORK; SIMONE LEIGH: PHOTO BY PAUL SEPUYA; MARY SABBATINO: PHOTO COURTESY GALERIE LELONG.
Sunday, October 18, 2015 Righting the Balance 3:00 p.m. Welcome Susan Fisher Sterling, NMWA director 3:15 p.m. Introduction Maura Reilly, author, curator, critic and event co-organizer 3:30 p.m. The Issue Jillian Steinhauer, senior editor, Hyperallergic, and Sarah Douglas, editor-in-chief, ARTnews 4:00 p.m. The Market Mary Sabbatino, vice president/partner, Galerie Lelong, NY, and Gabriela Palmieri, Sotheby s senior vice president and senior specialist for contemporary art 4:30 p.m. The Artist s Voice Ghada Amer, Micol Hebron, Simone Leigh and Guerrilla Girl Alma Thomas 5:15 p.m. What s Beyoncé got to do with it? Jamia Wilson, movement builder, feminist activist and storyteller Closing Remarks Lorie Mertes, NMWA director of public programs 6 8 p.m. Sunday Supper Table talk and communal supper served family-style Register at nmwa.org/events/fresh-talk-righting-balance.
Carrie Mae Weems Can an artist inspire social change? Sunday, November 15, 2015, 5 6 p.m. Sunday Supper, 6 8 p.m. Over the past 30 years, artist and activist Carrie Mae Weems has developed a complex body of work that has employed photographs, text, audio, installation, and video to investigate family relationships, gender roles, and the histories of racism, sexism, class, and political systems. Weems discusses her belief that the responsibility of an artist is to make art, beautiful and powerful, that adds and reveals; to beautify the mess of a messy world, to heal the sick and feed the helpless; to shout bravely from the roof-tops and storm barricaded doors and voice the specifics of our historic moment. Presenting sponsor Carrie Mae Weems: Photo courtesy the John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Register at nmwa.org/events/ fresh-talk-change-design Change by Design Can design be genderless? Wednesday, January 27, 2016, 7 8 p.m. Catalyst, a cocktail hour with a topic and a twist, 8 9:30 p.m. Alice Rawsthorn: Photo courtesy The New York Times Company; Gabriel Maher: Photo by Alwin Poiana 2014 In conjunction with NMWA s exhibition Pathmakers: Women in Art, Craft, and Design, Midcentury and Today on view Oct. 30, 2015 Feb. 28, 2016, Netherlandsbased designer Gabriel Ann Maher, whose work is in the exhibition, and Alice Rawsthorn, design critic for the international edition of The New York Times, participate in a conversation that considers whether design culture has become less misogynistic or felt any impact from recent conversations about gender transition.
Change by Design Can an artist use science and technology to heal the environment? Wednesday, March 2, 2016, 7 8 p.m. Followed by Catalyst, a cocktail hour with a topic and a twist, 8 9:30 p.m. Director of the Environmental Health Clinic at New York University Natalie Jeremijenko, an artist and engineer, bridges the scientific and art worlds by prescribing creative health solutions for the environment such as creating singing bivalves that signal water quality and a pack of robot dogs that monitor pollution. Jean Case, an engaged philanthropist, investor and pioneer in the world of interactive technologies, is one of the guest speakers who will join Jeremijenko to discuss ideas and strategies for advancing women s innovations in technology. During the Catalyst cocktail hour, D.C. s technology and maker communities join the conversation. photo Courtesy The Lavin Agency
Change by Design Can a bicycle be an agent of change? Sunday, May 15, 2016, 3 8 p.m. Film Screening at 3 p.m. Sunday Supper 6 8 p.m. Let me tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world. It gives women a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood. Susan B. Anthony In celebration of bicycle month, NMWA hosts a Suffragist Social Ride that culminates in a picnic-style Sunday Supper featuring conversations on the role of the bicycle as an agent of social change. The program also includes a screening of Wadjda, 2013 a film directed by Haifaa Al-Mansour about a young girl who enters a Koran recitation competition at her school in the hopes of winning enough money to buy her own bicycle. Still from Wadjda, 2013. Courtesy Sony Pictures Classics.
15th St. 14th St. 13th St. 12th St. 17th St. 16th St. SUMMER & FALL 2016 UPCOMING FRESH TALK PROGRAMS: Change by Design: Women Behind the Lens Where are all the Great Women Filmmakers? Change by Design: Women Building Impact Can architects build to better communities? Change by Design: Fashion as a visual manifesto Can you wear your politics on your sleeve? Righting the Balance II Can collectors and curators lead the way? Admission $25 for general admission $15 for members, seniors, and students. Includes museum admission and complimentary dinner or cocktails where noted. Reservations required. For more information, contact freshtalk@nmwa.org. Where National Museum of Women in the Arts 1250 New York Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20005 Info nmwa.org 202-783-5000 Lafayette Square Pennsylvania Ave. The White The House White House McPherson Square H St. Franklin Square I St. NMWA New York Ave. Metro Center
Women, Arts, and Social Change (WASC) is a bold new platform composed of programs highlighting the power of women and the arts as catalysts for change. Programs convene women from a range of disciplines people whose socially conscious ideas are reshaping lives and economies, engaging communities, and empowering women. WASC is a unique forum for leading innovators and thought leaders to engage audiences in creative conversations on art, design, gender, equity, the environment, identity, education, health, social and economic opportunity, and more. The National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) is the world s only major museum solely dedicated to celebrating the creative contributions of women. The museum champions women through the arts by collecting, exhibiting, researching and creating programs that advocate for equity and shine a light on excellence. NMWA highlights remarkable women artists of the past while also promoting the best women artists working today. The museum s collection includes over 4,700 works by more than 1,000 women artists from the 16th century to the present, including Mary Cassatt, Frida Kahlo, Alma Thomas, Lee Krasner, Louise Bourgeois, Chakaia Booker, and Nan Goldin.