The story of modern art as conventionally told inevitably runs from Monet and Cezanne through to Picasso, Kandinsky, Duchamp and Dalí.  This day of lectures paints a new picture of avant-garde experimentation before and after WW1 by showcasing the lives and careers of the many female artists who also contributed to the Modernist movement, and are only now receiving due recognition.  They include Harriet Backer, Marie Krøyer, Suzanne Valadon, Olga Rozanova, Sonia Delaunay and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

1. Early Pioneers in Paris

It was in Paris that numerous women first began to make their mark as professional artists.  By the time they gained the right to study at the École des Beaux Arts in 1897, the pioneering Académie Julian already had over 600 female students.  This lecture considers pathbreaking female artists based in Paris such as Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Marie Laurencin, and Paula Modersohn-Becker.

2. Seekers of New Forms

By 1910, women artists had grown in stature.  Pursuing careers which often crossed European borders, they numbered amongst the boldest members of the avant-garde.  This lecture will look at how artists such as Hilma af Klint, Helene Schierfbeck, Marianne Werefkin, Alexandra Exter, Vanessa Bell and Natalia Goncharova contributed to the ferment of ideas that would lead ineluctably to abstraction.

3. Modern Eclectics

This lecture explores the diverse achievements of female creative talent in the dynamic years following the First World War.  Embracing new media and technology, artists like Lyubov Popova, Marianne Brandt and Tamara Lempicka expressed their own spirit of modernity in vibrant work which looks confidently to a future of gender equality.