ART 411

     Linda Nochlin’s essay, "Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” examines the limitations and discrepancies preventing broader recognition of women’s success in visual arts, analyzing the historical and institutional factors that played a role to their inhibition, rather than presumptions of feminine inferiority or lack of talent that have held them back. Nochlin addresses how societal structures, cultural norms, and institutional barriers of these times debatably continue to play a restricting role women from artistic opportunities.      “There are no women equivalents for Michelangelo or Rembrandt, Delacroix o Cezanne, Picasso or Matisse…” (Nochlin 5). Each person is a widely, greatly recognized male artist. However, what defines the female equivalent? Why is there no great female artists equally recognized? What in fact, is a great artist? To answer the latter is to discover the root of what is wrong with the question “why are there no great wom...

     As stated in Walter Benjamin’s “Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” “In principle, a work of art has always been reproducible" (2): Apprentices replicate their masters’ work, and historically civilizations minted coins and woodcut. When photography and technology surpassed all other reproductive capabilities, it virtually took over the artistic process in creating art. The difference between a student replicating the work of their educator to learn and a machine reproducing work is intent. What causes controversy in replicating work is the underlying exploitation of said work(s), devaluation of the originality of the first, and decrease in it’s “cult value” by promoting exhibition capable traits. Benjamin’s publication goes over how reproducing artworks devalues the original artwork which then influences it’s “aura” but also acknowledges how there is no such thing as a perfect replication.      When an artwork is reproduced, it changes...