Sonja K. Foss’s Article, “Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party: Empowering of Women’s Voices in Visual Art” is a good explanation of generative theory, that being: It is a theory that has ‘the capacity to challenge the guiding assumptions of the culture, to raise fundamental questions regarding contemporary social life, to foster reconsideration of that which is ‘taken for granted,’ and thereby to generate fresh alternatives for social action. (24)
First, I would like to express my belief in this theory, but not the idea of a submerged group needing to find their authentic voice by excluding all others. The idea that the only way I can be heard is by excluding the other half of humanity is illogical.
My belief is that once we stop seeing in color or sex, then we will have achieved true equality. If we see ourselves or them as “other,” we are seeing others as enemies, no matter how much we may deny that position. I confess I cannot speak of the black male experience with the authority of a black male, nor vice versa, but one day the labels will dissolve.
In one of our Adobe Connect meetings we were discussing speaking for the other, and I proposed what I just wrote, the classmates that are African Americans were upset at thinking I would assume to have the ability to speak for them. They did not listen to what I was truly proposing. I stopped talking, thinking my idea was too
radical. I still believe that one day we can be one only when we stop thinking, “This is my black friend, my gay friend, my Asian friend, etc.”
However, if I were Foss and chose a work of art to demonstrate my theory, I would have chosen the exhibit I saw at the Freedom Center in Ohio: Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. An explanation of the exhibit is as follows:
The traveling exhibition Women Hold Up Half the Sky was inspired by the critically acclaimed book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. Featuring documentary photographs, visual art, sound installations, and interactive opportunities for visitors to get involved, Women Hold Up Half the Sky is a wake-up call to the injustices perpetrated against women worldwide and the ways we can effect change. Confronting the malign persistence of sex trafficking, gender-based violence, and maternal mortality, the exhibition tells stories of women from around the globe who have changed their lives through education, economics, and self-determination. Among them is Saima Muhammad, who lived in fear of her abusive husband and whose community ignored her suffering until she received a $65 microloan and built an embroidery business that now supports thirty families in her Pakistani village. The exhibition also spotlights visionaries like Edna Adan Ismail, the former first lady of Somalia, who used her life savings to build a maternity hospital in war-torn Somaliland, prompting donations and support from all over the world. Experience these
tales of perseverance, courage, and hope—and celebrate how individuals can be part of workable solutions. (About the Exhibition)
Foss’s choice of The Dinner Party while being a visually beautiful exhibition, is not the one I would have chosen for an attempt to demonstrate a “subordinate or submerged group” attempting to be heard in its “own authentic voice” (Foss).
I want to explain my statement concerning Foss’s choice of art. Foss claims that The Dinner Party is: …apart from the male-dominated world outside the setting of the exhibition. It is a separatist piece not only because it deals exclusively with women’s culture but also because it lacks reference to anything male. Women’s achievements are the sole focus of the work, and men are not referred to in any way in it. (17)
I understand what Judy Chicago was attempting when she designed The Dinner Party. Her use of items reserved, typically, for women: needle works, cooking and serving dinners, butterflies, vaginally suggestive images, China paintings, etc. are an expression of “positive and valuable. (21) I also understand Foss’s use of Chicago’s work to demonstrate her belief in Ferguson’s statement that, “When members of a submerged group attach the system from within…attempting to change it, they are doomed to fail” (19). Foss expresses her belief that Chicago accomplished the goal of “posing an alternative to the dominant discourse…” (19).
My issue with The Dinner Party is not the exquisite artwork. I was mesmerized while looking at the photographs on the Internet of Chicago’s artwork. My issue is the idea of creating a piece that attempts to give agency to women, while most of the women in Chicago’s artwork were intertwined with men and male dominance. Chicago and Foss either choose to ignore this fact, or they are unaware. I doubt the latter is the case.
To illustrate my concern, I will point out some of the celebrated women. Saint Bridget was, in fact, an Irish pagan goddess of fertility. The Catholic Church transformed her into a saint because of the Irish’s devotion to her. I have been to her well in Newbridge, Ireland. Women still leave prayers tied to her tree and drink from the well named for her in hopes of bearing children. I have sipped from her well, but as the pagan goddess not as the saint, as I am a Pantheist.
Kali, the goddess of empowerment is also known as Kala. Shiva is her consort, and he is known for death, therefore she is as well. Hatshepsut took on the role of a male in order to be pharaoh. Theodora was a dancer who caught the eye of her future husband. She did, however, say purple was a great color to die in while on the dock where her husband, Justinian I, was ready to flee during the Nika riots.
Emily Dickinson kept her poetry to herself after an editor, most likely a male, told her that her poetry was not good. Only after her death did family members get her work published.
These are just several women displayed in a supposedly “female only” piece of art. Even the number of placemats per side is thirteen, representative of the last supper according to Foss’s description of Chicago’s work. The Last Supper was a male-dominated event (21). The number of place settings, thirty-nine, the cubed root equaling thirteen, also divisible by three, pertaining to mathematics, which was, and still somewhat is, male-dominated, as is the number of women in total included in the piece is 999 women, again a number divisible by three. I found the number of women that were researched (3,000) and the number that assisted Chicago (300) also interesting.
Alice Duar Miller studied mathematics and wrote, “The Maiden’s Vow” in 1923. She wrote the poem in trimeter: (A speaker at the National Education Association advised girls not to study algebra. Many girls, he said, had lost their souls through this study. The idea has been taken up with enthusiasm.) I will avoid equations,
And shun the naughty surd,
I must beware the perfect square,
Through it young girls have erred:
And when men mention Rule of Three
Pretend I have not heard.
Through Sturm’s delightful theorems
Illicit joys assure,
Though permutations and combinations
My woman’s heart allure,
I’ll never study algebra,
But keep my spirit pure.
Where I found Foss’s article strong was her explanation of what it was, she was trying to convey as far as the importance of submerged groups finding their “authentic voice” (11). Foss’s use of quotes from Foucault and Beckett to Friedan and Schultz added to making her point. Foss does a good job at enlightening the reader to Chicago’s back story, position and reason for creating The Dinner Party.
I think Foss passionately expresses her belief that the artwork she chose of Chicago’s is a good example of, “Refusal to create in opposition to a male enemy allows formation of positive, affirming discourse in contrast to that created from a sense of inferiority” (17). Foss explains the assumptions she realized she is requiring of her readers, as well as the standards that are used to evaluate Chicago’s artwork. She also shares the reactions of the viewer to Chicago’s work.
Maybe it is because I do not think we need, nor can, have discourse of one sex without including the other that I find more weaknesses in Foss’s article than I do strengths.
Works Cited
"About the Exhibition." 2014. Skirball Cultural Center. 4 May 2014 <http://www.skirball.org/half-the-sky/about-the-exhibition>.
Foss, Sonja K. "Judy Chicago's The Dinner Party: Empowering of Women's Voice in Visual
Art." Women Communicating: Studies of Women's Talk 1988: 9-26.
The Voice before the Void: Story and Poetry. 2014. <http://www.thevoicebeforethevoid.net/the-
maidens-vow-by-alice duer-miller/>.