What If Women Ruled the World?

From December 2023 until the end of October 2024, the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens (EMST) presents What if Women Ruled the World?, a three-part cycle of exhibitions exclusively dedicated to the work of women artists or artists who identify as female.

With the re-hang of one entire floor of the museum’s permanent collection and a series of twelve solo exhibitions of Greek and international artists of different generations, over the course of the next ten months the entire museum will gradually be taken over by women artists.  

Despite recent advances, as women artists and cultural practitioners are still underrepresented in most aspects of the art world, What If Women Ruled the World?, initiated by the museum’s artistic director, Katerina Gregos, aims to radically reimagine what a museum would look like if, instead of a few token pieces, works by women artists were the majority. 

She notes: “Especially in a country like Greece, where there was never a prominent organised feminist movement in the visual arts and women artists were systematically marginalised over decades, this is both an important statement and a redressing of a major imbalance. At a time when we are witnessing a resurgence of attacks on women’s rights in places far and wide, the question of female empowerment and gender equality, across the board, is more urgent than ever.” 

The exhibition WOMEN, together represents the first re-hang of the museum’s collection since 2019 and makes a bold statement by showcasing only work by women artists.

There are a total of 49 works by 25 artists of different generations, ten of which are Greek. Twelve artists and 24 works are from the D.Daskalopoulos Collection Gift, while twelve artists and 25 works are from the existing collection of ΕΜΣΤ. The exhibition also includes seven new acquisitions, as well as a new long-term loan of a major work by Etel Adnan, courtesy of the Saradar Collection.

While there is no single thematic narrative, rather several intertwining threads, there are many common points of reference and dialogue as well as conceptual and aesthetic affinities between works. The artists are preoccupied with a variety of issues, both related to gender and identity, as well as to social and political issues, and the entanglements between them, although what they mostly share is an interest in materiality and the handcrafted, existential or humanistic issues, and the ephemeral nature of all things. 

There are several works that incorporate and re-signify objects and materials extracted from the domestic/everyday environment which are transformed through meticulous manual sculptural processes and fragile gestures. The complexity of human existence and the quest around perennial questions of life and death are evident in several works, as is a preoccupation with entropy, breakdown, decay, and fragility, reflecting the current state of uncertainty. 

Enquiries into the body as a site of contestation and the multiple renderings of its meaning in relation to domesticity, work, sexuality, and self-representation are also explored. While the majority of works are not focused on the female condition per se, there is an underlying preoccupation with questions of equity or oppression and difference. 

Finally, there are artists who probe issues regarding history, memory and collective/cultural identities centering around the critical geopolitical position of Greece and its immediate geographic surrounds in South East Europe, the Mediterranean, and the former Levant. These are the territories of the former Ottoman Empire, and with them come a multitude of suppressed or marginalised histories that lay dormant in the wake of new nation building in the twentieth century. The legacy of this history and the current history of the wider region with its rich historical, cultural, and socio-political narratives lie at the heart of EMSΤ’s renewed collection policy. 

The programme posits an oft-repeated hypothetical question: would the world be a better place if women led governance and were key decision makers?

Would it mean the end of political and armed conflict and deadlock? Would human rights be better respected? Would economic policy be more socially equitable and considerate of the environment and our non-human companions? Would there be more discussion and compromise? And, ultimately, would the world be a more caring and compassionate place? Or would we bear witness to the same human flaws, corruption and abuses of power engaged in by those in critical decision-making positions. 

At a time when we are seeing the rise of predominantly male-driven authoritarian rule in Europe and beyond leading to social and political polarisation and heightened geopolitical tensions, it seems a timely moment for reflection.

Part I of What If Women Ruled the World? opens with:

WOMEN, together
New collection presentation
Curators: Katerina Gregos and Eleni Koukou

Chryssa Romanos
The Search for Happiness for as Many as Possible
Curators: Eleni Koukou and Dimitris Tsoumplekas

Danai Anesiadou
D POSSESSIONS
Curator: Ioli Tzanetaki

Leda Papaconstantinou
Time in my hands. A Retrospective.
Curator: Tina Pandi

Alexis Blake
Allegory of the Painted Woman
Curator: Anna Mykoniati
Series of performances from December 12–17, 2023

Yael Bartana
What If Women Ruled the World?
Two large-scale neon installations presented on the exterior façade of the museum

Part II of What If Women Ruled the World? opens on March 9, 2024 with solo exhibitions of work by Lola Flash, Bouchra Khalili, Tala Madani, and Malvina Panagiotidi, as well as special projects by Yael Bartana, Claudia Comte, and Hadassah Emmerich. 

Part III will inaugurate three further solo exhibitions of work by Bertille Bak, Penny Siopis, and Eva Stefani on May 10 2024.

Media queries
International: Amanda Kelly (Pickles PR) / National: Kassiani Benou (EMST | National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens)

EMST | National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens is funded by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture & Sports.