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Paintings of Illustrations of Women at Work / Maia Ruth Lee
Pamphlet bindings
FA.B102.2201
7 x 10.5 in; 17.8 x 26.7 cm
2019
Paperback cover. Stapled pamphlet bindings. Depicts nine paintings of India ink on canvas created in 2017. 24 pages. Second edition. Edition of 200.
"The paintings in this book reproduce designs originally created by Charles Horgath and published in 'Women at Work' (1996), a title in the Dover Clip Art series of royalty-free clip-art illustrations. Throughout the 80s, 90s, and early 00s, Dover published many 'Ready-To-Use' spot illustration collections, with titles like 'Men's Heads,' 'Senior Citizens,' and 'Appliances and Electronics,' for both commercial and personal use.
"The tropes taken as inspiration are often benign--the conucopias in 'Gourment Foods' recall antiquity--others, like 'Weddings' (of white, straight couples) or 'Oriental Designs,' range from dated to patently offensive. Depicting a wide range of professions and repeated in several sizes to accommodate a variety of uses, many of the read-to-use clip-art designs in 'Women at Work' are thus outliers. They posit soldier, firefighter and mother as equal (working) women, insisting on the legitimacy of all roles for women in society--a still unpopular notion. Yet other depicted professions, like masseuse, manicurist, or secretary, reaffirm stereotypes that persist today--a stark reminder that forward progress on gender equality continues to be a matter of two steps forward, one step back." -- colophon.