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As the modern era progressed, many traditional societal roles, based on rather inflexible ideas regarding the actions and behaviors appropriate to specific genders, came to be questioned and challenged. Modern artists, already emboldened by an avant garde practice which encouraged challenges to the status quo, sought to interrogate these traditional gender based roles and the limitations imposed by rigid and limited notions of masculinity and femininity. Thus the late 19th and early 20th century is rich with works of art, which promote, confuse, confound, and contradict earlier definitions of terms such as male and female, masculinity and femininity, and man and woman.

Transforming Gender/Picturing Difference presents a wide variety of images from the Wriston Art Galleries’ permanent collection in order to encourage investigation into and comparison of the variety of roles pictured and sometimes uncritically accepted in contemporary culture. Chosen from a broad spectrum of artistic movements and practices, the art works exhibit both conventional and revolutionary attitudes toward men and women and their activities and place in society.

Opening Reception: January 19, 7:00 - 8:30 p.m.
Lecture: "The Body Politic," 6:00 - 6:45 p.m., January 19, 2001