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Female artists have long employed collage to reflect the ways in which identity is often constructed from conflicting, contrasting, and contradictory parts. In this study session, Fiona Rogers (V&A Parasol Curator of Women in Photography) will present a range of objects from the V&A collection which embody use of 'femmage'—a radical reclaiming of craft traditionally associated with women—as a resilient method within feminist and political art.

 

From nineteenth-century cut and paste album-makers, to Modernist, Surrealist, and Dadaist innovators; radical, second-wave feminists and pioneering contemporary artists, this material offers an expanded definition of collage to encompass photomontage, assemblage, and the photogram.

 

The event is linked to Cut Out: A Feminist History of Photo Collage, Montage and Assemblage' a V&A and Thames & Hudson publication which explores the previously untold relationship between photography, feminist art, and collage through the V&A’s extensive collection of photography, spanning the nineteenth century to the present day.

 

Female artists have long employed collage techniques to reflect the ways in which identity is often constructed from conflicting, contrasting, and contradictory parts. Cut Out: A Feminist History of Photo Collage, Montage and Assemblage is a new V&A and Thames & Hudson publication which explores the relationship between photography and feminist collage, foregrounding the use of femmage—a radical reclaiming of craft traditionally associated with women—as a resilient method within feminist and political art.

This symposium will explore key themes of the book: women’s collage practices prior to Modernism’s claim to the form; the materiality of photography in the lives and work of women artists; the use of found or discarded images as gestures of resistance and resilience; and the significance of domestic space in shaping women’s cultural production.

 

Speakers include Martha Rosler, Linder, Jazz Grant, Liz Siegel, Freya Gowrley, Linder, Tania Sanabria, Jazz Grant, Maya Inès Touam, Sarah Sense, Thato Toeba, Bindi Vora and Renée Mussai.

 

Funded by the V&A Parasol Foundation Women in Photography Project.

 

Details of the new book are here: https://www.thamesandhudsonusa.com/books/cut-out-a-feminist-history-of-photo-collage-montage-and-assemblage-hardcover