This sumptuously illustrated book surveys five hundred years of artistic output from a pantheon of women who broke rules, defied convention, and paved the way for generations to follow. Why over the course of history have so few women been recognized as "great" artists? Explanations and rationalizations for this phenomenon abound, but women have been producing brilliant works of art for as long as their male contemporaries. This latest volume in the successful Icons series profiles forty-five female artists and their significant contributions to the canon of art history. This book starts in the sixteenth century, when women were first formally allowed to participate in the period's artistic enlightenment, and continues through today, when artists such as Louise Bourgeois, Cindy Sherman and Jenny Holzer have firmly established themselves as critically and commercially important. Icons of Women Artists uses elegantly designed double-paged spreads to examine the life, challenges and accomplishments of its subjects. Each entry includes a large-scale four-color reproduction of a specific work, a brief, illuminating biographical sketch, and accompanying illustrations, photographs and documents. Written with a scholar as well as the layperson in mind, this attractively designed, wide-ranging volume offers incontrovertible proof of the power and range of women artists.
