Women Contribution to Culture

Prior to beginning work on this assignment, review Did Women Have a Renaissance? https://thequestforwisdom.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/kelly_did_women_have_a_renaissanace.pdf and From 1971: Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists? http://www.artnews.com/2015/05/30/why-have-there-been-no-great-women-artists/ Also watch The Story of Women and Art: Episode 3. https://fod.infobase.com/OnDemandEmbed.aspx?token=86588&wID=100753&plt=FOD&loid=0&w=640&h=360&fWidth=660&fHeight=410
For this assignment, you will examine women’s contributions to the creation of culture in western society through a discussion of three key figures (artists, poets, writers, dancers, performers, composers, etc.) from our required or recommended resources. In your paper, you will also analyze how western society has shaped these women’s lives and their creativity.

Begin by selecting three key figures from different time periods and different genres who have made artistic contributions to our culture. You may either consider these elements separately as explained below or weave the ideas together as you discuss each of your key figures. Having selected your three key figures, analyze how their creativity made important contributions to culture in their own era and in some cases, how their contributions reverberated to different disciplines and different eras and time periods, perhaps even being felt today. You should provide detailed discussion of examples from their creative work (paintings, poetry, performance, methods of dance, music, etc.) to support your claim on the importance of their contributions. This section must be three to four pages in length.
Next, as you examine how society has shaped these women’s lives and creativity, consider some of the following questions.

How did prescribed gender roles for women impact their creativity?
What images defined women (seductress, mother, virgin, etc.)?
Which images and roles were acceptable and which were outside the norm?
How did these narrowly-defined gender roles and images (such as the “nature of women”) shape the lives and work of your three key figures?
Some women may have outwardly conformed to these expectations while their work challenged the roles/images in subversive and creative ways while others openly rebelled. As you delve deeper into these issues, consider the dynamics of gender and power in creative expression. For example, how does the subject matter in paintings and texts (or performance) reflect the dynamics of gender and power? Who has privilege? Who has power? How do these creative women sometimes deconstruct (break down) dominant male patterns while reconstructing female experience?

As you discuss how society has impacted women’s creativity, remember to consider the significance of race, class, and/or ethnicity of the three key figures. How does the artist’s class, for example, impact both the importance of her contributions and the ways society shaped her life and work? Does her ethnicity or race determine what subjects she writes about or paints or how she performs? Again, provide detailed examples from the creative women’s work (compositions, performances, sculpture, paintings, writings, etc.) to support your discussion (three to four pages).

In Summary, be sure that your Women Creating Culture Paper:

Identifies Three Key Figures from Different Time Periods and Genres, and Discusses Their Artistic Contributions to Culture
Discusses How the Identified Key Figures’ Made Important Creative Contributions to Culture in Their Own Area, and Provides Detailed Illustrations from Their Work
Analyzes How Western Society Has Shaped the Lives and Creativity of the Identified Key Creative Women
Analyzes the Impact of Race, Class, and/or Ethnicity of the Three Identified Key Creative Women’s Lives and Work

ANSWER

Women Contribution to Culture

Introduction 

When there was a change in the political systems from the Medieval feudal systems, women, for the first time, saw a difference in their political and social options. In the Renaissance era, women had very scarce and limited roles to play in society. They were inferior to men, and according to the community, they were only to be seen and never to be heard (Bendix, 2017). Their parents controlled them from their birth, and as soon as they got married, their husbands took over. Despite women being inferior to men, women from different classes had different roles to play. For instance, it was expected of low-class women to take care of household things and be housewives. Things were, however, unlike for women of the upper class. For example, instead of being housewives and running houses, the upper-class women helped their husbands run their businesses, and they worked for their husbands. Roadblocks like women not being heard just seen prevented women from exploring their talents from ascending to the top; hence they stayed at home and took care of children. The inequality between women and men and women of the upper and lower class was a significant contributor to inequity in the art world.

Angelica Kauffman painter 

Angelica Kauffman was a woman painter who was lucky to have a supportive family and unlucky at the same time to exist in a time when women were respected or treated near equal to the male counterparts. During her period, women’s role in the professional sphere was nowhere as they did not go to school (Tolley, 2017). All through Europe and England, women role was established to be at home and nothing more. Despite things being this way for most women, some lucky women managed to join and be a part of art academies and fortunately for Kauffman, and she was one of the lucky women. During her era, Angelica was a woman of style and influence. She saw and aligned herself with the Roman goddess of medicine, poetry, music and commerce. All these are evident in her self portrait of 1780. She was blessed to produce her first portrait before she was a teenager. Unlike most of this era, her parents saw her dreams earlier and supported them to the latter.

Additionally, she had a role model dad who allowed her to travel the world with him on his artistic tours. Unlike most women her age, she was lucky, and travelling with her dad allowed her to experience and learns a lot from him. She also learned a lot from other artists she encountered during their travels. Her exposure gave her the chance to expand and learn more from the artists she came across.

She was an exceptional woman of her time, and despite the advantage, she had over others, she worked hard to be a great painter. In addition to her artistic works in painting, Angelica was also a singer. Therefore, she played instruments, and at some point in life, she was torn between being a singer or a painter. She was one of the female founders of the Royal Academy of Arts, rare in this age. She motivated and changed many people’s opinions about women and their societal position. For instance, she went to school and followed her dreams, and she later became the best at what she did. In her self-portraits, she projects herself as an artist and not a fashionable societal woman. She does this by painting herself in classical dresses, and she holds a Porte crayon. She is an excellent example of what women could do or be if they got equal chances as men, and she contributed to the culture and history of her time by reminding the world that women could be better artists. She was a revelation to society that women could be more than homemakers and could do more than stay at home and look after the household and children. She propounded sensibility and recast the feminine terms during her time and paved the way for female artists.

Phillis Wheatley poet 

Phillis Wheatley was taken as a slave when she was hardly seven years old. As a black woman in America, she was by virtue a slave. However, lucky for her, she was sold to a wealthy merchant who took her in as his wife’s servant. She was unexpected, and unlike most girls, more so African American women of that time, she had more privileges than them (Gates, 2010). The Wheatley’s took her in, and she was educated. Within 16 months of going to school, she could read the Bible, Greek and British literature. She was privileged and exposed, which she took to her advantage to venture into her poetic interests. During this era, an educated black woman was rare as they were all considered slaves and nothing more. As the first black woman to publish her poetic books, she significantly contributed to black people’s culture and many American women who had lost hope. With her poetry, she managed to change the world and saw black people in America and the world. During this era, women could not go to school, and their parents defined them, and when they got married, their husbands took over. Things were worse for African Americans as, by nature, they were considered slaves.

When Phillis published her poetry work, she changed many people who believed women could not do anything apart from house chores and following their husbands around. In addition to this, she changed the perspective of many people in America and the world who thought African Americans were slaves and were not capable of creativity. She changed the world as people finally realized that women were equally creative and intelligent and could gain more from going to school. Partially her artistic contribution participated in the abolition movement. She was an example of what women could do if they went to school and had a similar chance as men. It is so because she came to America as a slave and ended up as one of the greatest and first poets to publish their works. She is a role model to many, and she changed the African American culture by uplifting the race as the first woman, an African American slave, to publish her poetry.

Francesca Caccini. Composer 

During her lifetime, Francesca was the most famous woman in the music industry in Europe. She was the first woman to compose the opera, which was also among the early operas. She played more than three instruments, which was unique as women did very little and were not to have careers. Francesca also benefited from her family to be successful in her career. She did that because her father was a composer, so she had firsthand experience from her father despite receiving musical education. She practiced with her father, worked, performed at women’s court, and perfected her ways. She had the opportunity most women of her time did not have.

She changed the culture because her composing and singing talents that were rare during her time.

With her unique voice, people realized that there was much more to women than just cooking and taking care of husbands and children. Her music was expressive, and she attracted more attention than most people expected a woman to have in the art industry. At first, people thought and argued that she went far and did more than was allowed for a woman of her time. From her performances, she received respect as a musician, something that a woman could hardly acquire. She was a revolution for many, both men and women composers, and she changed how women were viewed in society.

How society shaped their lives and creativity

For these women, society had many contributions towards their lives and creativity. As earlier mentioned, women were not to h=be heard as they were only to be seen. For men and women, reputation in society meant two different things. Female honour was to be more on sexual virtue, and women needed to be chaste. Society shaped the creativity of these artists in various ways. For example, Angelica Kauffman converted the societal restrictions and expectations. She did this differently, and one of the apparent ways she successfully did this was by capitalizing on women’s civilizations’ cultural beliefs. Phillis Wheatley, on the other hand, was highly influenced by religion more on her work. As a result, it led to protestants enjoying her work, and her work was a straightforward way to show the world that African Americans were also capable individuals.

Various things defined women during medieval times. These may include mother, wife, artisan and nun, to mention a few. Everything else depicted a woman except a career as they were allowed to neither have jobs nor go to school. It was their parent’s responsibility to decide on what career path they took for the ones who were lucky enough to go to school. Life was not easy for women worldwide, but it was even more challenging for the ambitious African American and lower-class women. Their position in society was different from that of upper-class women. It is so because, unlike the lower class women, the upper-class women could run businesses with their husbands. African Americans were even worse as they came to the European countries as slaves, and that is what people say whenever they saw a black individual. It is evident in the two lives between Wheatley and Kauffman. These two women made history during their time, but race and social class determined them. In that, Wheatley was a slave and the first African American to publish poetry, while Kauffmann was a privileged girl who had a supportive parent. Kauffman was different from most women of her time because she had the chance to choose a career, between being a painter and a singer, rare. Things were not easy for the two women, but they were a little easier for Kauffman than Wheatley because of race and class. Race influenced Wheatley’s work as she wrote poems about slavery and its impacts on society. According to her, pain and suffering were a part of her identity. It is for this reason that she wrote more about it in her poetry. Kauffman tried to portray herself in her portraits like a noblewoman from her mum’s side.

References

Bendix, R. (2017). Nation-building and citizenship: Studies of our changing social order. Routledge.

Gates Jr, H. L. (2010). The Trials of Phillis Wheatley: America’s First Black Poet and Her Encounters with the Founding Fathers. Civitas Books.

Tolley, T. (2017). Painting the Cannon’s Roar: Music, the Visual Arts and the Rise of an Attentive Public in the Age of Haydn. Routledge.

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