'Old Mistresses - Women, Art and Ideology' by Rozsika Parker and Griselda Pollock

Criticism and Analysis

‘Old Mistresses: Women, Art and Ideology’ written by Rozsika Parker and Griselda Pollock is a text that has often been cited or recognised in the work of other academics, particularly with relation to feminist writings and art education. The book provides an account of women’s place in art and why they have been ignored or misrepresented; this expands on other literary accounts by feminist writers such as Linda Nochlin and Ann Sutherland Harris, who wrote works on women’s art. There were not many comprehensive books on women’s art history and their place within it until the 20th Century, and writers such as Nochlin and Harris sought to address this. Parker and Pollock expand on and explore a range of theories in Old Mistresses; they seek to discover why women artists are seen as naturally inferior to their male counterparts and why; drawing on the historical contexts in which women practised art. Their aim is to discover why there are still unequal, patriarchal attitudes in contemporary art practise, and how the understanding of this may aid a deconstruction of art history upon which an equal ideology can be formed.

Lawrence Alloway reviews Old Mistresses in ‘Visible Female,’ an anthology of feminist theory and essays. He begins also, by highlighting the fact that there have been no in depth texts exploring women’s art history. He states that Parker and Pollock echo Linda Nochlin and Anne Sutherland Harris’s work; however they complain that Nochlin and Harris write from values of a ‘male serving art history.’[1]In Old Mistresses Parker and Pollock describe how Nochlin and Harris want to merely add in women artists to art history, which to Parker and Pollock means they are subscribing to a conventional model of art history. They believe that the histories of women artists should be taken into account, and call for a deconstruction of the present structure of art history. However, Nochlin states in the introduction to her collection of essays entitled, ‘Women, Art and Power and Other Essays;’ ‘I do not conceive of a feminist art history as a positive approach to the field, a way of simply adding a token list of women painters and sculptors to the canon.’[2] This would seem to contradict Parker and Pollock’s impression, yet, Nochlin wrote this introduction several years after both she and Harris began writing and also after Old Mistresses had been completed, and she herself admits that her theories have evolved over the years. Also, in Nochlin’s essay, ‘Why have there been no great women artists?’ Nochlin does, in fact, discuss the historical context in which women artists worked, however Alloway points out that Parker and Pollock criticise Nochlin for her approach to this topic: they explain how if as Nochlin believes, there have been no women artists because of effective institutional exclusion and conflicting attitudes, then there would have been no women artists at all. Alloway says that based on their interpretation of Nochlin’s text, Parker and Pollock give the impression that there can be either no women artists or there are; he does not agree with this, it cannot be an either/or situation, and explains how the problem with the history of women artists is retardation and rerouting, not obliteration, and that Nochlin addresses these complex problems of women in history as part of the subject. On the other hand, throughout Old Mistresses Parker and Pollock state that there have always been women artists, and that Nochlin should concentrate more on the ways women worked through these restrictions, rather than stating that that is the reason why there are no great women artists. However, if it is to be taken as Alloway interprets it: that they suggest that there can either be great women artists or none at all, by stating throughout the book there have always been female artists, their idea that there can have been none is contradicted. Alloway also believes that Parker and Pollock’s ideas of deconstruction are an ‘ultimistic view,’[3] suggesting that he is able to conceive other ideas of how to approach the problem of women in art.

In addition to Parker and Pollock’s discussion of previous texts looking at the subject of women in art, they look in more detail at individual subjects such as specific women in history and their relation to the history of art. Their treatment and the works they produce give an insight into the way women have progressed into the art field. Alloway affirms in his review that Old Mistresses contains proficient sections on individuals, such as on Anguissola, a female artist from the Renaissance, and also on broader topics, for instance; their discussion on craft and the female stereotype. Alloway also says that during their discussions on individual women artists, they stay clear of sentimental excursions through the accounts of the women’s lives. Mieke Bal, in ‘Autopopography: Louise Bourgeois as Builder’ cites Old Mistresses as he discusses the issue that by focussing on the biography of an artist, it distracts away from a viewer focussing on the art itself[4]. Parker and Pollock also mention that by concentrating on a female artist’s life, it can lead to her work being dismissed, as elements of her life may eclipse her paintings. However as Parker and Pollock mention throughout Old Mistresses, one must look at the historical and social context in which the artist worked in order to understand the conditions and restrictions they operated under, and I believe to do this the artists biography must be taken into consideration to a certain extent.

Alloway mentions the subtitle of Old Mistesses, Women, Art and Ideology, he suggests that the word ‘ideology’ assumes the present to be taken as the viewpoint; the way in which we estimate comtemporaneity informs and distorts the past. The final chapter of the book in which Parker and Pollock discuss contemporary art, Alloway perceives to be weak, proposing that the book therefore lacks strong ideological awareness. He describes how the chapter starts with an ‘arguable’ yet interesting look at feminism in relation to surrealism but then the authors begin to lose their art historical grip. Alloway does not understand why the authors chose to discuss Frankenthaler and Hesse as American feminist artists, as there were many others that would perhaps illustrate their ideas more. He goes on to say that Art Historians have a problem with understanding contemporary art, as art of the present does not have clear guidelines. Despite Parker and Pollock not wanting to conform to the ideologies of a patriarchal, traditional art history, Alloway argues that by being unable to write effectively about modern art, they are sharing the professional habit of the majority of art historians, and ergo, are at conflict with their feminism. He also voices the opinion that the title, Old Mistresses, is ‘deplorable’ as the term ‘mistress’ suggests a prostitute. He declares that the term does not have the same ‘honorific’ connotations as ‘master,’ and is therefore jocular and disparaging. I feel that Alloway is not recognizing the ironic notions of this title: the fact that it is re-appropriating the term ‘master’ to ‘mistress’ to highlight the patriarchal associations with the term ‘old master.’
One of the women artists that Parker and Pollock discuss at length is Vigee LeBrun. Mary D Sheriff discusses their attitudes to LeBrun in her essay ‘So what are you working on?’ She states that Parker and Pollock are less kind to her than other women artists they discussed, portraying her as merely a society lady on the wrong side of the revolution, and disassociate her with feminist goals.[5] Emma Barker in ‘Women Artists and the French Academy: Vigee LeBrun in the 1780’s,’ also suggests that Parker and Pollock offer LeBrun up as a sexual object, conforming to the feminine stereotype constructed by masculine ideology.[6] Sheriff believes that LeBrun should be considered from a feminist perspective, and highlights that Parker and Pollock take into account the feminist ideologies in Mary Cassatt and Berthe Morisott’s work even though they came from an elitist background whereas LeBrun was the daughter of a hairdresser. With their social backgrounds in mind, it would make more sense to deem Cassatt and Morisott as reflecting more bourgeois ideology in their work; however Parker and Pollock believe that they instead, showed the limitations of a woman in a bourgeois household. In Old Mistresses, they do admit that some believe Cassatt’s work not to be a critique of bourgeois thought, but a confirmation of it, although they find feminist beliefs behind it. Sheriff believes that it is merely because LeBrun represented herself in a traditional way, that Parker and Pollock dismiss feminist connotations with her work. Brown also agrees saying that they are against the notion of an instinctively feminine artist. Mary Sheriff considers LeBrun to have portrayed herself intentionally as a female artist and how her associations with Marie Antoinette lead people to believe that her work contained Bourgeois values, however recent work declares Marie Antoinette as being denigrated because of the period’s fears of strong women: this may cast a different light on Vigee LeBrun’s connection with her.

Nochlin also mentions in her introduction to ‘Women, Art and Power and Other Essays,’ that her essays were written in specific historical contexts, in response to problems at the time.[7] The same thing could be said about Old Mistresses, as it was written just after the 1970’s, a time when feminism and women’s rights were being discussed to a great extent. As feminist ideologies were particularly strong at this point, the dismissal and misrepresentation of women in art would have been highlighted, and writers such as Nochlin, and later, Parker and Pollock began to address it. At the time, there were still considerable amounts of equality in society; the writers would have been seeking to challenge the patriarchal structures and to draw attention to the inequalities still present, in what was for them, the present day. In our present day however, texts such as Old Mistresses may seem outdated, as the inequalities in society have been addressed and confronted, and therefore such feminist texts may not seem as relevant today as they were then. Nevertheless, the art field today still holds a patriarchal structure, as the history on which it is built upon has formed a strong ideology that is difficult to change. Old Mistresses is therefore still relevant as it discusses the historical basis which has created patriarchal art history, and shows how it affects future women artists.

Jo-Anne Berlowitz discusses gender with Martin Berger in an interview about Berger’s book, Thomas Eakins and the Construction of Gilded Age Manhood[8]. Berlowitz asks Berger about the difficulties that Eakins may have had with the gendering of painting in a Realist style, as this was sometimes considered a feminine style of painting. Berger replies, referring to Parker and Pollock’s explorations in Old Mistresses, into how the character of work is often based on the sex of the artist. They discuss that art by women is seen as inferior, not for the talent the work shows, but because women artists are ‘naturally’ lacking in creative talent, and men are designed to be genius’s. Parker and Pollock use the example of a painting, ‘A Portrait of Charlotte du Val-d’Ognes,’ originally attributed to Jaques-Louis David, and was highly acclaimed. In 1951 Charles Sterling re-attributed the painting to Constance Charpentier, and consequently, the painting is now seen in a different, inferior, light[9]. Martin Berger states, however, that Parker and Pollock do not argue that; ‘the gendering of a given profession is wholly reducible to the sex of ‘typical’ members or that all professions practiced by men are valued to an equal extent.’ Berger expands on Parker and Pollock’s theory; that in patriarchal society, professions are gendered as either male or female based on the sex of the majority of the people employed in this field. However, even all male professions can be seen as feminine in gender, for instance, artists, despite the majority of the practitioners being male and that women struggle to be accepted within the field. Hierarchies within the art profession can also change depending on the time period; Berger uses the example of oil painting being seen as a masculine art from and watercolour being regarded as feminine in 1870’s America.

Parker and Pollock place emphasis in the first chapter on the fact that the ‘feminine’ stereotype emerged as a result of bourgeois ideology and Victorian writings on nature. I believe that the stereotype existed before these times to a certain extent, as although bourgeois values enormously affected the ideas that women should be in a domestic environment taking care of the children, these beliefs also pre-existed before then. Parker and Pollock mention the genre of flower painting in 16th Century Holland: although the flower paintings were created by men and by women, they were not accepted as great works of art as they were ‘feminine’ in nature as they depicted flowers. These views show that the feminine stereotype was considered before the 19th Century. In addition, Parker and Pollock proclaim that the feminine stereotype plays a large part in the disregard and misrepresentation of women’s art in history. However art by female artists has been largely ignored throughout the history of art, therefore, if as Parker and Pollock suggest, the feminine stereotype did not emerge until the 18th/19th Century, then something else may have affected the lack of interest in women’s art. Parker and Pollock do admit in their conclusion that this book is not a conclusive study of history and that there are many gaps and generalisations[10], therefore this may explain the generalisation of the emergence of the feminine stereotype. wowver Ho

Despite Old Mistresses limitations with regard to providing a full historical account of women in art, the main point is addressed, and that is that throughout history, women artists have been ignored. Parker and Pollock conclude with stating that women’s place in the history of art is contradictory, as they are always present but represented as always absent or always the same.[11] They explain how the reason for the female stereotype is to provide a negative against which masculine art can dominate. Parker and Pollock expand on previous works on this topic and what they achieve is a fascinating investigation into the reasons behind women’s creativity being regarded as inferior to men’s supposed ‘genius.’ The extent of the research, from works or art by women in the Renaissance, broad topics on craft and design, to contemporary women artists, does not fail to show that throughout time, due to historical, social and psychological factors, the art world has become, and perhaps always has been, a patriarchal domain and Pollock and Parker conclude that the only way to undo this is to call for a deconstruction of art history.
[1] ALLOWAY, Lawrence. (1987) ‘Old Mistresses’ IN ROBINSON, Hilary (ed.) ‘Visibly Female’ – Feminism and Art Today – An Anthology Camden Press Ltd. London p. 201
[2] P xii Nochlin
[3] ALLOWAY, Lawrence. (1987) ‘Old Mistresses’ IN ROBINSON, Hilary (ed.) ‘Visibly Female’ – Feminism and Art Today – An Anthology Camden Press Ltd. London p.202
[4] BAL, Mieke. (2002) Autopopography: Louise Bourgeois as Builder. Biography. 25 (1) pp/ 180-202

[5] SHERIFF, Mary D. (2003) ‘So what are you working on?’ – Categorizing the Exceptional Woman. IN Singular Women – Writing the Artist. FREDERICKSON, Kirsten, WEBB, Sarah E (eds.) University of California Press Ltd, London
[6] BARKER, Emma. (1999) Gender in Art – Women Artists and the French Academy; Vigee LeBrun in the1780’s. IN, PERRY, Gillian, CUNNINGHAM, Colin, BARKER, Emma. (1999) Art and its Histories. Yale University Press in association with the Open University
[7] Nochlin p.xii
[8] BERELOWITZ, Jo-Anne interviews BERGER, Martin. (2003) Refashioning Masculine Identity Genders 37
[9] PARKER, Rozsika, POLLOCK, Griselda. (1981) Old Mistresses: Women, Art and Ideology. Pandora Press, London p. 106
[10] PARKER, Rozsika, POLLOCK, Griselda. (1981) Old Mistresses: Women, Art and Ideology. Pandora Press, London p. 170
[11] PARKER, Rozsika, POLLOCK, Griselda. (1981) Old Mistresses: Women, Art and Ideology. Pandora Press, London p. 169