Welcome to Art Insights
By Margo Hobbs
Welcome to the rebooted national WCA blog, Art Insights! Editors Marianne McGrath and Susan Noyes Platt are committed to offering fresh perspectives every month on women working in the arts, in the form of interviews, studio visits, and reflections. We think you’ll enjoy it and hope you’ll visit regularly. If you have an idea for a post, Marianne and Susan welcome your contributions.
Updating the WCA blog is one of the significant initiatives of the WCA Art Writers Committee which formed after the June 2020 Board Meeting as a way of enhancing the visibility of writers in the organization. Art historians helped to found WCA 50 years ago and continue to advance its mission alongside critics, essayists, and bloggers. Re-envisioning Artlines as a substantive arts journal has been our other project (with credit due former WCA President Susan M. King for starting the process).
The relaunched Artlines will be published on the national website this month. Edited by Rosemary Meza-DesPlas and Shantay Robinson, it features articles that consider the intersection of activist arts and social justice in relationship to the Black Lives Matter movement. An elegant new design by Allicette Torres and Sahiti Bonam makes space for longer form writing and ample illustrations. The managing editorial team of myself, Patti Jordan, and Jess Long are working on a call for participation for future issues—look for it here and in PULSE this spring.
After many years as a tenured professor of art history, Susan is currently an independent art historian and freelance art critic and curator, based in Seattle. Her most recent book is the first volume of her collected writings, Breaking Ground Art Modernisms, 1920–1950 (Ingram, 2020). She is currently working on Volume 2, to be titled Setting Our Hearts on Fire. She writes a monthly column for Leschi News and maintains her own website and blog at www.artandpoliticsnow.com
Marianne is an independent art curator. After a successful decade working in museums curating exhibits and presenting art and education programs, she founded MKM Art Consulting, which offers curatorial projects and consulting services to art institutions, galleries, and artists. Marianne holds a BA degree in Art, MA degree in Art History and her professional affiliations include ArtTable, College Art Association and the Women’s Caucus for Art. mkmartconsulting.com
Much gratitude to all of you in the efforts to establish connections and communication on the wide range of issues and engaging creative work exploring these issues.