Guerrilla Girls. Not Ready To Make Nice

Opening: November 9, 7–9pm

This fall, the Guerrilla Girls’ breath of inquisitive air sweeps over the Grand Est. More active than ever, invariably politically incorrect, the American collective takes over the spaces of 49 Nord 6 Est for a show orchestrated by Xabier Arakistain, a staunch supporter of the feminist cause. An opportunity to (re)discover their work: books, films and archive photographs of their actions undertaken in the public space. As well as their emblematic posters from the 49 Nord 6 Est Collection, Not ready to make nice, the title of this exhibition, which traces 30 years of artistic insurrection, says it all.

Concerned with the lack of equality—whether gender, race, or class—in international museums, the Guerrilla Girls have taken up arms. Becoming the “conscience of the art world,” anonymous behind their gorilla masks, these activists have relentlessly denounced all forms of discrimination, exposing the under-representation of women and minorities in our society. The sheer magnitude of the task has inspired countless avenging activists to put on masks and join their ranks. This unifying energy has been the driving force behind the creation of activist collectives around the world. Veritable 21st century Robin Hoods, the Guerrilla Girls continue to galvanize the cultural sphere with their famous posters and the lacerating wit of their provocative actions. They sound an urgent call to arms.

Join us at 49 Nord 6 Est for creative action workshops, a self-defense course, and intersections between art and activism. Like the Guerrilla Girls, become super-hero.ine.s, whether you like wearing tights or not.

Guerrilla Girls are a collective of anonymous artists founded in 1985. Determined to give precedence to the political dimension of their work and to denounce the systematic oblivion to which women are subjected in contemporary societies, the members of the collective decided to remain anonymous by wearing gorilla masks and taking the names of illustrious women who were already deceased. The collective use facts, humor and outrageous visuals to expose gender and ethnic bias as well as corruption in politics, art, film, and pop culture undermining the idea of a mainstream narrative by revealing the understory, the subtext, the overlooked, and the downright unfair. They believe in an intersectional feminism that fights discrimination and supports human rights for all people and all genders. The group has done over 100 street projects, posters and stickers all over the world, including New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Mexico City, Istanbul, London, Bilbao, Rotterdam, and Shanghai, to name just a few. The Guerrilla Girls also do projects and exhibitions at museums, attacking them for their bad behavior and discriminatory practices right on their own walls, including their 2015 stealth projection about income inequality and the super rich hijacking art on the façade of the Whitney Museum in New York or the celebrated project for the Venice Biennale 2005. They have also have retrospective exhibitions in Bilbao and Madrid, Guerrilla Girls 1985-2015 and have done a number of specific projects, like Is it even worse in Europe? (October 2016–March 2017) at the Whitechapel Gallery or the week-long major public project at Tate Modern (October 4–9, 2016).

Xabier Arakistain (Madrid, 1966) is a feminist curator based in Bilbao. He incorporated the category of sex as a curatorial criterion since his first exhibition, Trans Sexual Express (Bilbao Arte, 1999). Between 2001 and 2003 he introduced gender parity into the exhibition programme at Fundación Bilbao Arte Fundazioa. In 2005 he launched Manifiesto Arco 2005 demanding that public administrations adopt practical measures to implement equality between the sexes in the field of art, which inspired article 26 of Spain’s Equality Act. He was Director of Centro Cultural Montehermoso Kulturunea, Vitoria-Gasteiz, from 2007 to 2011, making it a pioneering institution in the development and application of feminist policies in the fields of contemporary art, thought and culture. In 2008, concerned about hurdles to the transmission of feminist knowledge between generations and the shortage of feminist texts in translation, he initiated, in collaboration with feminist anthropologist Lourdes Méndez, the yearly interdisciplinary, international and intergenerational course Feminist Perspectives in Art Production and Theories of Art that since 2012 is held at Azkuna Zentroa, Bilbao. Xabier Arakistain has also curated retrospective shows devoted to Feminist Art pioneer Judy Chicago and to the US collective Guerrilla Girls as well as the shows What I see Susan Hiller (co-curated with Beatriz Herráez), Living Together (co-curated with Emma Dexter) and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, 86 steps in 45 Years of Art and Feminism.

Thanks to: Amy Harrison, Azkuna Zentroa, Alhóndiga Bilbao, Matadero Madrid