Seeing and Consciousness: Women, Class and Representation

Description

Through its provocative examination of feminist and Marxist approaches to women's art and female representations, this book challenges the widespread belief that Marxism has nothing valuable to contribute to women's studies. The author argues that, from the French Revolution through to the present, gender and class have shaped visual imagery. She shows how Marxist theory can function to question some of the premises of feminist art histories and to provide a more accurate understanding of the meaning(s) of visual imagery.

Gen Doy De Montfort University

'Doy bravelly challenges the orthodoxy that feminist theory has a monopoly on explanation. Her contention is that feminist art historians have virtually ignored the important contributions of Marx and Engels to understanding women's oppression and to women's emancipation, particularly Engels' book Origins of the Family (1884). [...] Doy provides an incisive and thoughtful account of class versus gender, economic base versus cultural superstructure debates. [...] Art history students weaned on the new art history will find Doy's revisionist, questioning book worth reading because it will cause them to think again.' Art monthly "(Doy's) text is useful ... for those who want an introduction to critical debates in art history, for she covers an extremely wide range of periods and debates, well supported by a selection of fifty-four illustrative plates" Women: A Critical Review