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#5WomenArtists at OMCA

For Women’s History Month, the National Museum of Women in the Arts has brought back its annual social media challenge to ask, “Can you name five women artists?” Faced with inequality in the arts world, this challenge is meant to inspire conversation and bring awareness about incredible women to a large audience.

To wrap up women’s history month and continue to celebrate women throughout the year, we are spotlighting five women artists featured in our galleries and collection.

For Women’s History Month, the National Museum of Women in the Arts has brought back its annual social media challenge to ask, “Can you name five women artists?” Faced with inequality in the arts world, this challenge is meant to inspire conversation and bring awareness about incredible women to a large audience.

OMCA is proud to join hundreds of institutions in meeting this challenge by highlighting five incredible women artists from our galleries and collection. These women are diverse as they come in terms of their medium, subject matter, background, and stories. Check out their work in the slideshow above and learn more about these artists below.

 

Consuelo Underwood
Consuelo Underwood’s work in weaving and textile design holds powerful messages about her Chicana heritage and calls attention to the dangers of trying to cross the border from Mexico into the United States. Underwood’s work was featured in OMCA’s Dias de los Muertos exhibition in 2011 and her tapestry series “Heroes-Burial Shroud Series” currently hangs in the Gallery of California Art.

Miné Okubo
Miné Okubo was working in Oakland as an artist in 1941 when she and thousands of other Japanese American citizens were put into internment camps and forced to abandon everything. Despite this, Okubo made over 2,000 drawings in charcoal, watercolor, pen, and ink, depicting her everyday experiences. Okubo’s work was featured in the Gallery of California History’s Sent Away, But Not Forgotten section and her painting “Mother and Cat” is now in the Gallery of California Art.

Helen Nestor
Helen Nestor was an important documentary photographer who specialized in recording the political and social changes of the 1960s in California, including the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley, Vietnam War protests, and more. OMCA acquired her archive and celebrated with a solo exhibition of her work, Helen Nestor: Personal and Political, in 2000.

Favianna Rodriguez
Favianna Rodriguez’s art address themes of migration, economic inequality, gender justice, and ecology. Her work has been shown at OMCA multiple times, in installations and as part of the Gallery of California Art and the Días de los Muertos exhibitions.

Faith Ringgold
Faith Ringgold is a painter, writer, speaker, and performance artist  known for her activism in the New York City art world in the 1970s, bringing attention to the lack of women artists represented in major museums and galleries. Her work was most recently on view at OMCA in the special exhibition All Power to the People: Black Panthers at 50.