Ilse von Randow would become a central figure in the development of modernist craft weaving in New Zealand. Her hand-woven textiles were quickly taken up by the local avant-garde and in 1952 she was awarded the Esmonde Kohn Prize for excellence in the applied arts by the Auckland Society of Arts.
With the establishment of the Māori Women’s Welfare League in 1951, Rangimārie joined as a founding member. She began teaching traditional Māori weaving to women within the community as well as in schools. She wanted to retain the traditional art form, which at that time was in jeopardy, and the league proved an ideal platform for its revival.
Marjory Mills was one of New Zealand’s leading embroiderers, a talented artist and a successful businesswoman.
Artist, playwright, actor, novelist, director
Sculptor Mona Hatoum is part of a generation of artists who started to work more commonly across different media in order to best present their intended message.
Jenny Holzer’s approach to language, choice of unusual settings, and focus on issues of social and cultural importance have influenced a generation of neo-Conceptual artists.
One of France’s leading Conceptual artists, Calle’s life and work redefines the role of the artist or author. Her influence can be seen in the work of later “first-person” artists, whose lives and art are also intertwined.
Annie Leibovitz is known as a celebrity portrait photographer, and has become just as famous as the people she photographs. A master at capturing popular culture icons in dramatic and innovative ways, she has paved the way for other contemporary commercial photographs, like those of Mario Testino, to also be seen as legitimate works of art.
Lawler’s nuanced form of Institutional Critique has suggested a way forward for subsequent generations of artists who would come to examine their own position as creators. Her chief emphasis on the conditions of presentation and reception have paved the way for many strands of contemporary art’s practices that emphasize situation and relationality as an indispensable factor of any artistic experience.
Simmons’ use of dolls to explore prescribed gender roles and representations of femininity has opened up space in which other feminist artists can work, facilitating the legitimacy of styles of cultural critique that do not fit within masculine molds.