"The Two Fridas" now on display at the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw
21 November 2025
The exhibition "The Woman Question 1550-2025", which was organized by curator and art historian Alison M. Gingeras, refutes the idea that women were mostly absent from the art world prior to the late 1800s. Over the course of the last 500 years, women artists have demonstrated enduring and dynamic creativity, as displayed by the nine-part visual narrative. The result is a collection of almost 200 pieces that provide a centuries-long visual history of women's "emancipation," ranging from paintings by Renaissance, Baroque, and 19th-century women artists to more recent pieces.
The exhibition seeks to demonstrate the strength of a feminist approach to art history, one that calls for justice, revives the voices of the "erased," and results in a revision of the so-called canon, in addition to showcasing a wide variety of artistic practices.
"The Woman Question 1550–2025" brings together works by almost 150 women artists, divided into nine thematic sections:
- Femmes Fortes: Allegories and Agency
- Palettes and Power: The Self Portrait as Manifesto
- Education and the Canon
- A Muse of Her Own
- Surreal Self, Mystical Me: Symbolism, Surrealism and Mysticism
- Anonymous was a woman
- No Gate, No Lock, No Bolt: Imaginaries Unleashed
- Of Woman Born
- Wartime Women
The chapter "Of Woman Born" explores motherhood as a lived experience as well as an institution, drawing on Adrienne Rich's feminist treatise. The exhibition addresses pregnancy, loss, birth, reproductive choice, and maternal power through pieces by Elisabetta Sirani, Madame du Coudray, Paula Modersohn-Becker, Marlene Dumas, Frida Orupabo, Monika Sjöö, Catherine Opie, Clarity Haynes, Everlyn Nicodemus, Louise Bourgeois, Tracey Emin, and Frida Kahlo.
From 21.11.2025 to 03.05.2026
Other info at the Warsaw Museum of Modern Art website below.
