PAST

Drawn exclusively from the Hirshhorn’s rich collection and occupying the full outer galleries of the Museum’s third floor, Put It This Way brings together close to a century of art in a wide range of media organized in thematic groupings, offering new paths for exploration and emphasis. Titled after a 1963 painting by American pop artist Rosalyn Drexler, whose work is featured in the exhibition, “Put It This Way” is organized by Hirshhorn Associate Curator Anne Reeve. The exhibition will speak to traditionally marginalized artists’ decisive and virtuosic achievements to investigate a wide array of aesthetic, political and historical concerns. The full-floor presentation is intended to prompt and encourage conversations around the significance of gender in creating and perceiving an artwork and the effects of categorizing artists by gender.

Encompassing a wide range of media, subject matter, sensibilities and approaches, the exhibition will engage with the complexities and contradictions of approaching art through the lens of gender and the idea of “woman artist” as an easily defined or decisive category. Set against current and ongoing conversations regarding gender, power and professional recognition, “Put It This Way” captures the breadth, radicality and rigor of art made by traditionally underrepresented artists and investigates the ways that gender itself can be understood in relation to the creation and presentation of art.

Artists in the exhibition are Agnes Martin, Alma Thomas, Amy Sillman, Ana Mendieta, Anne Truitt, Anni Albers, Arlene Shechet, Barbara Hepworth, Betye Saar, Billie Zangewa, Carlotta Corpron, Carolee Schneemann, Cecily Brown, Christina Quarles, Dana Awartani, Deana Lawson, Deborah Roberts, Diana Thater, Dorothea Rockburne, Emily Mae Smith, Eva Hesse, Eva LeWitt, Guerrilla Girls, Helen Lundeberg, Isa Genzken, Jay DeFeo, Jennie C. Jones, Joan Mitchell, Judy Dater, Julia Thecla, Katharina Fritsch, Kiyan Williams, Lee Bontecou, Lesley Vance, Liz Deschenes, Loie Hollowell, Louise Nevelson, Mary Bauermeister, Michelle Stuart, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, Nancy Spero, Niki de Saint Phalle, Rachel Jones, Rosalyn Drexler, Saskia Olde Wolbers, Senga Nengudi, Sondra Perry, Zanele Muholi and Zarouhie Abdalian.

Images courtesy of Ron Amstutz and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.