Jacqueline Fahey


General summary of the ideas, beliefs, attitudes etc that motivate the artists

*Jacqueline Fahey was born in 1930 in Timaru. She was one of the first New Zealand women artists to paint from a feminist perspective.
*Family commitments (including three daughters) have resulted in certain periods of her career being more productive artistically than others, but she has been able to work continuously since 1978.
*In the early sixties she co-organised a group show with Rita Angus at the Centre Gallery, Wellington - probably one of the first consciously 'gender-balanced' exhibitions in New Zealand.

*For much of her career Jacqueline Fahey has worked in variants of an expressive realist style, focusing - in the years when this was deemed unfashionable, and more recently - on women's experience within the home, on family interactions including generational and marriage conflict ('Mother and Daughter Quarreling', 1975, Robert McDougall Art Gallery, Christchurch, 'Drinking Couple, Fraser Analyzing my Words', 1978, Auckland Uni) and self-image.
In 1981 -82 Fahey's 'Hill of Bitter Memories' is a powerful work from this phase which explores both Maori and Pakeha history. Tragedy, irony and a sharp wit characterize many of Fahey's works.

*she used her domestic surroundings as a source for her art which dealt with her feminist analysis of society.
*Her work of the 1950s demonstrated an awareness of feminist issues and prefigured the Women's Movement.
*Fahey's work has a number of recurrent themes at its heart. She uses her work to validate women's domestic labour, reclaim and affirm women's live and daily experiences as important and challenge culturally imposed roles.
*Her painting has largely dealt with her personal life, especially her relationships with other women. As such it is largely autobiographical and makes a challenge to accepted assumptions about what subjects are suitable for 'art'. She does not represent the domestic world as an ordered idyll, but rather attempts to represent the conflict and challenge that is often involved.


Examples of 2 Representative works by the artist
SELF-PORTRAIT AS WARRIOR WOMAN, 1957
Self-Portrait as Warrior Woman, 1957, indicates Fahey's approach at this stage.
SUBJECT
The portrait is dominated by her own image, holding a palette and a paintbrush in her hands. The background depicts the domestic surroundings, probably in her home, with a glass jar, plate, jug etc on the table behind the figure. The entire painting is achieved in the semi-abstract style.
MEANING
Fahey portrays herself as harsh and hardened, ready to 'square off' with whomever approached. Her palette is held up lie a shield and she brandishes her paintbrush like a weapon. The title of the work emphasizes this reading.

STYLISTIC FEATURES
The painting is Fahey's early example of feminist art. (as discussed above). It is painted with heavy solid colours and black outline, where the composition is semi-abstract in that the viewpoint is the consistent, this is best indicated by the table top.


MY SKIRT'S IN YOUR ¡K¡K. ROOM!, 1978-9

SUBJECT
The painting shows two girls argued in a typical kitchen. It based on the domestic surrounding of the artist, details of which are included in a realist style. And the situation also based on one of the family issues.

MEANING
My Skirt's in Your ¡K¡K.Room! was painted for the touring theme show Mothers organized by the Women Artists' Gallery in 1981. It demonstrates a number of the above themes.
It deals with an argument between Fahey's teenage daughters over clothes - a distraction typical for artists who are mothers. While she uses her own family, she sees their situation and her emotions as universal. The setting and subject can be seen as a desire to validate the domestic and personal.

STYLISTIC FEATURES
The painting is feminist based, mainly due to the subject matter.
While the painting affirms domestic and personal experiences as suitable subjects for art it also makes a strong political statement.
The Queen Elizabeth Arts Council (QEII) had asked Fahey to complete two new paintings by Christmas of that year which she saw as a lack of awareness of the conditions under which women artists work. Fahey includes the letter and the envelope on the table in the foreground. On the table is a copy of Ann Sutherland Harris and Linda Nochlin's Women Artists 1550 - 1950, a crucial text in the drive during the 70s to rediscover and re-evaluate historical women artists.





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