CLASS DESCRIPTION

Emerging from the counter cultural movements of the 1960s and 1970s in Europe and America, the ‘goddess movement’ enjoyed widespread influence on contemporary art of the period. At the centre of the movement was a belief and interest in the recovery of a prehistoric matrilineal and matrifocal pre-history, a promise that was bolstered by the field work and theories of archaeologists such as Marija Gimbutas and feminist scholars and writers such as Charlene Spretnak, Merlin Stone, Helen Diner and Riane Eisler. This lecture traces the ways in which artists associated and influenced with the original movement experimented with politically motivated works critiquing patriarchy, racism, male domination, violence and extraction capitalism and presented alternative empowering models for female sexual liberation and self-actualisation, as well as greater ecological awareness in tune with developments in scientific microbiological thinking of the time such as Gaianism.

Until recently, goddess feminism and feminist spirituality have existed at the margins of feminist art history, and have been as troubling and problematic to feminist theorists as they were to patriarchal history. Now, amid a wide resurgence of interest in artists from the original movement (Monica Sjöö, Carolee Schneeman, Mary Beth Edelson) we will consider how a younger generation of artists have become attuned to the expanded possibilities of feminist spirituality and have adopted goddess figures, signs, symbols and icons of female spiritual power.

ABOUT OUR LECTURER

Dr. Catherine McCormack is an art historian and author of books including Women in the Picture: Women, Art and the Power of Looking, and Defiant Women: The Art of Activism as well as numerous essays for museums and galleries. She has over twenty years experience teaching art history and has held teaching positions at University College London, University of Oxford, University of the Arts, London, and Sotheby's Institute of Art. Catherine has curated exhibitions and programming around contemporary art and motherhood, and radical female joy, and regularly contributes arts and culture criticism for both print and radio.

INSTAGRAM: @womeninthepicture

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This is a recording of a live session hosted by The Feminist Lecture Program in May 2026. The reading list for the class can be found alongside this rental.

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