Organised by Royal Academy
Artist Chantal Joffe RA and exhibition curator Professor Dorothy Price discuss the pioneering women artists in our ‘Making Modernism’ exhibition.
This event can be enjoyed in person at the Benjamin West Lecture Theatre, or via a digital livestream. For more information please email tickets@royalacademy.org.uk.
In this conversation, Chantal Joffe and Dorothy Price discuss the artists featured in our Making Modernism exhibition, talk about Joffe’s own practice, and consider what it means to be a woman artist.
Joffe and Price connected over their shared admiration for the women artists who were central to the development of modernism in Europe in the early 20th century. Paula Modersohn-Becker, Kӓthe Kollwitz, Gabriele Münter and Marianne Werefkin explored themes of identity, representation and belonging and directed radical new approaches to art in Europe.
Also reflecting on these themes, Joffe’s own arresting portraits of women bring a combination of insight and integrity, as well as psychological and emotional force, to the genre of figurative art. Her portraits and self-portraits encourage reflections on the perception and representation of the female body in art.
Chantal Joffe RA uses broad, fluid brushstrokes to create depictions that testify to the concerns of women from diverse walks of life. She has exhibited nationally and internationally and her work is in numerous institutional and private collections. She was awarded the Royal Academy Wollaston Prize in 2006 and elected an RA in 2013. Joffe has recently created a major new public work for the Elizabeth line station at Whitechapel.
Professor Dorothy Price is Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art and Critical Race Art History at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London and the curator of Making Modernism. She is a Fellow of the British Academy and former Editor of the journal Art History. As a specialist in German Expressionism, Weimar Culture and Black British Art, she has authored numerous books and articles in both areas.