Why Cerise became a man
by: Irene Borngraeber | posted: Feb 9, 2009
Cerise started showing under a pseudonym three years ago when she felt her career had hit a wall. "I was involved with the same galleries and I really didn't feel like they were giving me the exposure I needed", she explains between sips of her coffee on the dreary day we met in Union Square park. She was showing, and even selling a fair amount of work, but Cerise felt that she was stuck in system that favored the edgy, the provocative and the male. Cerise didn't decide to remake her artistic image because she felt it was lacking, she decided to rename herself because she felt it would help her get ahead in an art world that still seems to be driven by gender politics.
Cerise pulled her works, nixed her website, and started from scratch; this time representing herself as a man. The effect wasn't immediately apparent. "I couldn't use any of the contacts I had made because they would recognize my work, so it took a long time to come up with new leads". She eventually found a gallery interested in representing her, one that miraculously didn't become suspicious when she, posing as a "friend of the artist", dropped off several pieces.
And lo and behold, the works sold—and they kept selling. Maybe it was a question of finding the right gallery, or breaking into a new collector market, but to Cerise there is no question that what made her a success the second time around was the fact that she was perceived as being a man. So much so, that she doesn't even want me to use her new name.
There are indisputably more male contemporary artists represented in New York galleries than women, but does being female really put you at a disadvantage when it comes to making it big? Jerry Saltz's own figures compiled for New York Magazine are bleak: of 240 solo shows held this fall in contemporary New York galleries, just 31 percent were by women. And the gap becomes even greater when you factor in the male to female ratio of contemporary art held in the permanent collection of major museums. Pressure and opposition to female artists can account for the few surviving examples of historical works by women artists (try to name a female "Dutch Master"), but such societal constructs about the role of the artist aren't really pertinent today. Or are they?
I think most people would bristle, probably rightly, at the idea that contemporary art is considered a male domain. I too, find the assertion that men somehow have a "leg up" in the current art climate difficult to swallow. Yet the fact remains that women are underrepresented in the discipline, especially among the high-ranking stars in galleries like Opera or Gagosian (just take a look at who they represent). If we have indeed moved beyond the need for the truly feminist art that supposedly broke down the barriers between male and female and challenged assumptions about gendered-creation, then why are we still seeing such a gaping disparity?
Feminism in itself seems tired, a leftover philosophy from a war already fought. We have, supposedly, evolved beyond the need to highlight gender as a means of personal identification. But just as explorations of race have resurfaced in contemporary art, asking questions about how artists, and societies relate to changing perceptions, feminism is due for a comeback. Not "feminist art" as it was defined in the 1970's, but an acknowledgement that there are still differences in the treatment and acceptance of works by contemporary female artists. Perhaps there will always be more men working and showing as artists, and that might be fine, but as long as women like Cerise feel they have to trade their gender for success, the art machine is broken. Ignoring the gender stratification of contemporary art won't make the issue go away, and it certainly will not ensure that works of exceptional vision are recognized.
Would Cerise ever go back to her real name? "Maybe," she admits, "but not right now….I'm better as a man."
