Cleveland Institute of Art presents Women to Watch – Ohio in Partnership with Ohio Advisory Group of the National Museum of Women in the Arts

Show highlights five nominees for biennial exhibition at the Women’s Museum in Washington, DC

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Cleveland Institute of Art, in partnership with the Ohio Advisory Group of

the National Museum of Women in the Arts, presents Women to Watch – Ohio, an exhibition

featuring five accomplished Ohio women artists who are pushing the boundaries of

contemporary art in ceramics, tapestry, painting and drawing, photography, installation,

printmaking, and mixed media.

The featured artists are CIA graduates Christi Birchfield (Class of 2006) and Lauren Yeager

(Class of 2009); and Hildur Ásgeirsdóttir Jónsson, Mimi Kato, and Eva Kwong.

According to the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA), 51% of visual artists today

are women, yet only 5% of work on display in US museums is by women, and work by women

makes up only 5% of major permanent collections in the US and Europe. And according to a

research paper, “The Gender Gap in Art Museum Directorships,” published by the Association

of Art Museum Directors, women hold just 24% of art museum director positions at museums

with budgets over $15 million and earn 71¢ for every dollar earned by male directors.

Women to Watch – Ohio shines a light on these disparities, while showcasing five artists who

come from across the country and around the world but now call Northeast Ohio home.

The exhibition was initiated by Barbara Richter and Harriet Warm who are founders and cochairs

of the Ohio Advisory Group (OAG) of NMWA. This group of influential Ohio women

convened to advance the museum’s mission by promoting Ohio women artists and creating

exhibition opportunities both locally and at the Women’s Museum in Washington, DC.

On behalf of the OAG, Richter and Warm tapped curators Reto Thüring, of the Cleveland

Museum of Art, and Rose Bouthillier, of the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, to identify

deserving, underrepresented artists according to criteria presented by NMWA. Bruce

Checefsky, Director of CIA’s Reinberger Galleries, selected the works for Women to Watch-

Ohio and curated the exhibition with the assistance of Jen Rokoski, a graduate level intern who

was recruited by the OAG from the Art History and Museum Studies program at Case Western

Reserve University.

“We’re thrilled about the collaborative nature of this exhibition,” said Richter. “It is wonderful to

see so many prominent arts institutions in Cleveland working together to showcase Women to

Watch – Ohio.” Warm added, “The association with NMWA and the international Women to

Watch exhibition in Washington, DC brings additional visibility and prestige to the project.”

All five artists in Women to Watch – Ohio were nominees for Organic Matters – Women to

Watch 2015, which opens on June 5, 2015 at NMWA in Washington D.C. Curators from the

museum chose Kato to participate in that international show, which recurs on a biennial basis.

It is the first time that an Ohio-based artist will be represented. Kato, who works in

photomontage, is a 2013 recipient of a Creative Workforce Fellowship from the Community

Partnership for Arts and Culture.

Women to Watch – Ohio is the last major exhibition scheduled for the Reinberger Galleries in

CIA’s George Gund Building on East Boulevard. The college is vacating that building as it

unifies its campus on Euclid Avenue with the recent completion of a new George Gund

Building adjoined to its historic Joseph McCullough Center for the Visual Arts. The East

Boulevard building is being sold to Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland

Museum of Art.

“We’re organizing this exhibition because women have been under recognized in exhibitions in

this region and nationally, and this is an important effort to show the significance of their

contributions,” Reinberger Galleries Director Checefsky said. “These particular women artists

represent the very best artists in the region and have reputations that extend nationally and

globally.”

CIA President Grafton Nunes echoed that sentiment. “Cleveland Institute of Art was founded in

1882 as the Western Reserve School of Design for Women and has educated generations of

accomplished women artists since then,” he said. “It is particularly fitting that CIA is cosponsoring

this exhibition, which showcases five women artists, highlights the hurdles that

women artists face, and precedes a significant international exhibition at the National Museum

of Women in the Arts in Washington."

Public Events

Women to Watch – Ohio opens to the public with a reception in CIA’s Reinberger Galleries on

Thursday, April 2, from 6-8 pm. As part of CIA's Lunch On Fridays series, the featured artists

will participate in a public panel discussion on women in the arts on Friday, April 10, 2015, at

12:15pm in Aitken Auditorium in the Gund Building. Rokoski will moderate the forum.

The Artists

According to Rokoski, the curatorial intern, Kato’s creates performative photomontages, which

feature her image embedded into traditional yet modernized Japanese landscapes. Yeager’s

mixed media installations of everyday objects (like pencils and construction cones) function as

urban taxonomy, organizing seemingly banal objects and systems into something more

interesting and often absurd. Birchfield’s printmaking looks to both the natural and mechanical

world in efforts to create her own nature morte that is anything but lifeless. Inspired by both

macrocosmic and microcosmic environments, Kwong’s ceramic sculptures are direct

manifestations of the natural world. Jónsson’s textile-formed paintings recall the landscape of

her native Iceland.

NMWA and the Ohio Advisory Group

The National Museum of Women in the Arts, based in Washington, DC, is the only museum

dedicated to celebrating women artists through exhibitions, acquisitions, educational initiatives

and archival research. (Read more at nmwa.org.) The Ohio Advisory Group of NMWA provides

leadership, guidance, and resources in support of the museum's mission and works to elevate

the profile of accomplished women artists from Ohio. The founding members of the Ohio

Advisory Group are distinguished women leaders in Ohio who share a passion for art and/or

advocacy for women. In addition to founders and co-chairs Richter and Warm, members

include Victoria Bell, Diane DeGrazia, Marilena Disilvio, Diane Downing, Helen Forbes Fields,

Susan Goldberg, Sally Gries, Shannon Lundeen, Ellen Stirn Mavec, Sharon Milligan, Kristin

Morris, Sandra Pianalto, Barbara Robinson, Catherine Scallen, and Eliza Wing.

Women to Watch - Ohio is the final installment in CIA’s year-long series, Community Works:

Artist as Social Agent. The series focused on socially engaged art.

Sponsorship for Women to Watch - Ohio was provided by Huntington Bank and media partner,

ideastream, which includes WVIZ/PBS, 90.3 WCPN, and WCLV 104.9. Additional funding was

provided by the Ruby Shoes Fund of the Jewish Federation of Cleveland.

About CIA

Founded in 1882, Cleveland Institute of Art is an accredited, independent college of art and design

offering 15 majors in studio art, digital art, craft disciplines, and design. CIA extends its programming to

the public through gallery exhibitions; lectures; a robust continuing education program; and the

Cinematheque, a year-round art and independent film program. CIA’s public programming is supported

in part by the residents of Cuyahoga County through a public grant from Cuyahoga Arts & Culture. For

more information visit www.cia.edu.