Femagogical strategies in the art school: navigating the institution

ABSTRACT

This writing aims to define and examine ‘femagogy’ and the transformative potential for an inclusive intersectional feminist teaching practice in Fine Art education in the context of the contemporary Irish art school. This writing will trace the influence of linguistic power structures and the influence of broader institutional patriarchy in an educational setting and outline the inspirations and genealogies of femagogy. This writing provides situated embodied examples of femagogy in practice. It proposes the femagogical model of teaching as one that situates itself outside prevailing patriarchal models and proposes strategies to reimagine knowledge production and navigate the prevailing structural patriarchy in the academic systems of the contemporary art school.

KEYWORDS:

• Femagogy
• contemporary art
• embodied knowledge
• feminism
• decolonising
• art education

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Amy Walsh is an artist and lecturer in Fine Art at TU Dublin and a PhD candidate at the centre for Gender Feminisms and Sexualities at University College Dublin. Amy is also an activist and campaigned to repeal the eighth amendment to the Irish Constitution with Termination for Medical Reasons and Together For Yes. Over the last number of years, Amy has worked with many activist organisations, NGOs, artists, academics, journalists and broadcasters to share her story and the stories of others in the pursuit of reproductive justice. Amy’s artwork and research have been exhibited nationally and internationally. Her work ‘Mná na hÉireann’ (Women of Ireland), a portrait to honour and commemorate the women at the centre of Ireland's legal cases that challenged Ireland's ban on abortion, is currently on exhibition in the National Gallery of Ireland as part of the Zurich Portrait Prize (2019). Significant solo exhibitions of Amy’s work include The Talking Earth at the Butler Gallery in Kilkenny and Freefall at the West Cork Art Centre. Amy has undertaken numerous international artist residencies, including the Broken Hill Art Exchange and the Bundannon Trust in Australia, Titlting Cultural Society in Fogo Island in Canada and the Icelandic Association of Visual Artists. Her work is included in many public and private collections including the Benetton collection, the Western Health Board and the Art of the Irish State.

Barbara Knezevic is an Australian-born artist and educator living and working in Dublin. Her work has been shown internationally in museums, public and private galleries. She is a member of the teaching faculty of the Fine Art Department, Dublin School of Creative Arts at the Technological University Dublin, and has published writing in journals such as Circa Art Magazine, Paper Visual Art, Eyeline Magazine, commissioned texts for catalogues and in 2013 she published an artist’s book titled Object Registry. She has been commissioned for public art projects such as a work to commemorate the loss of young lives in the Easter Rising at the GPO Dublin, (2016) and a commission for children in Cabra Library, Dublin (2020). Recent exhibitions include Immurement, STATION Gallery Melbourne, Oonagh Young Gallery, Dublin; The MAC, Belfast; Temple Bar Gallery + Studios, Dublin; EKKM, Tallinn; Gallery Augusta, Helsinki; Solstice Arts Centre, Navan; Tulca Festival of Visual Art, Galway; HIAP, Helsinki; The LAB, Dublin City Council; Project Arts Centre, Dublin; EVA International, Limerick. Her work features in National and Private Collections such as the Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection 2018 and her recent installation at Temple Bar Gallery + Studios ‘Exquisite Tempo Sector’ is part of the collection of the Art Council of Ireland. In 2020 she will present a major solo exhibition at the Royal Hibernian Academy in Dublin.