An A-Z of Women in Art
By Gabrielle Stein
Whilst 51% of visual artists today are women, their representation across the art market remains inadequate, particularly in comparison with their male peers. In the top commercial galleries of Europe and North America, only 13.7% of living artists represented are women.
Nevertheless, women are on the rise in the art world. Global auction sales for women artists increased by 24% from 2023 to 2024, reaching approximately £770 million, with several new auction records achieved above £10 million.
This International Women’s Day, explore the following list of 26 phenomenal women artists working through time who have indefinitely left their mark on visual culture.
Alia Ahmad: A young Saudi Arabian artist represented by White Cube. She creates dream-like paintings where colours swirl and blend together, taking inspiration from Arabic calligraphy.
Bridget Riley: An English painter whose geometric forms sometimes evoke optical illusions of vibration. Lines, circles, squares and curves are part of Riley’s distinctive formal language.
Cornelia Parker: Best known for her striking installation and sculptural work, notably ‘Cold Dark Matter: An Exploded View’, Parker presents domestic objects in unprecedented ways.
Sonia Delaunay: As co-founder of the Orphism movement, Delaunay embraced strong colours and geometric abstraction. She was the first living woman artist to have a retrospective at the Louvre.
Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun: One of the most successful portrait painters of 18th Century France. Most famously depicted Queen Marie Antoinette.
Faith Ringgold: Worked during the Harlem Renaissance in New York, best known for her narrative quilts. Ringgold challenged perceptions of African American identity and gender inequality.
Global auction sales for women artists increased by 24% from 2023 to 2024
Eva Gonzales: A French Impressionist painter known for her depictions of quiet bourgeois life, and recognised as part of a historically key quartet with Cassat, Morisot and Bracquemond.
Hilma af Klint: A long underappreciated Swedish painter, but now credited with some of the first major abstract works in Western art history. Her bold paintings are harmonious when viewed in sequence.
Iris Van Herpen: A prolific Dutch fashion designer who opened her own label in 2007, known for striking fusions of technology and haute couture.
Joan Mitchell: Created drawings, prints and gestural oil paintings across 20th Century Chicago, New York and France. Said famously that “painting is what allows me to survive”.
Frida Kahlo: A revolutionary artist transformed into a commercial icon. The Mexican painter is best known today for her brilliantly coloured self-portraits and overwhelmingly personal subject matter.
Louise Bourgeois: A prominent sculptural artist working across France and America who used recurring motifs (body parts, houses and spiders) to explore childhood trauma and female sexuality.
Marina Abramovic: A Serbian performance artist highly praised for her pioneering approach which tests the limits of physical and mental endurance.
Alice Neel: Celebrated as one of the great American portraitists of the twentieth century, Neel’s work rejected avant-garde movements in favour of an expressionistic style.
Georgia O’Keeffe: Hailed as, ‘the mother of American modernism’, O’Keeffe’s most famous paintings respond to nature through flowers, leaves and mountain landscapes.
Portia Zvavahera: Lives and works in Zimbabwe creating bold, unnerving paintings where emotions are personified. Zvavahera layers ornate colour in veil-like patterns to build up elaborate, expressive surfaces.
Lauren Quin: A contemporary oil painter living and working in Los Angeles, Quin uses chrome to create forms that are hypnotizing as they intertwine and oscillate.
Paula Rego: A great printmaker and storyteller, the Portuguese-British artist depicts characters who emulate emotion from innocence to fantasy and power.
Sarah Sze: A multimedia artist working in America, Sze’s intricate installations depict measured chaos. Her architectural background is evident in the structural nature of each piece.
Tracey Emin: An extremely important contemporary artist. Confessional, autobiographical and raw. Visit the landmark exhibition Tracey Emin: A Second Life at the Tate.
Ursula von Rydingsvard: A sculptor living and working in New York, predominantly using cedar and bronze to make works that are monumental as well as highly personal.
Suzanne Valadon: The first woman painter to be accepted to Beaux-Arts in Paris, Valadon started as a muse before quickly mastering the craft herself and becoming an established artist.
Rose Wylie: A British painter still reinventing the medium at 91 years old. See paintings packed with references to cinema, celebrities and literature at the new Royal Academy exhibition open this week.
Yin Xiuzhen: A leading figure of contemporary Chinese art. Best known for sculptures and installations made up of recycled objects such as clothing and suitcases.
Yayoi Kusama: A globally renowned Japanese artist working across sculpture, painting, installation, performance and fashion. Known for her obsessions with polka dots and pumpkins.
Helen Zughaib: Concerned primarily with repeating, tile-like geometric patterns, Zughaib has worked across the Middle East and America, creating works that are mesmerising in colour and form.
An alphabet can only go so far, but here it serves the purpose of bringing women to the foreground. These 26 artists are pioneers in their fields, and their work deserves to be seen, studied and remembered.
Image: Eva Gonzales ‘La Fenetre’ via Wikimedia Commons.
Sources: https://nmwa.org/support/advocacy/get-facts/
https://www.womeninartprize.com/news/women-in-art-get-the-facts
