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I have come to the conclusion that the "art world" has to join us, women artists, not we join it. When women take leadership and gain just rewards and recognition, then perhaps, "we" (women and men) can all work together in art world actions. Until the radical rights of women to determine such actions is won, all we can expect is tokenism. When men follow feminist leadership to the extent that women have followed male leadership, then sexism is on its way out. Also, until we see women getting from 40 to 50% of the financial rewards, museum and gallery exhibitions, college jobs, etc., etc., etc., it is still tokenism. When women artists attain this, then we'll know the sexist system is over. Hopefully women artists will not be satisfied with parity, but will continue to search for alternatives. Women's goals must be more than parity. The established patterns in the art world have proven frustrating and mostly non-rewarding to women a artists since the ideal feminist stance of alternate structures is contradicted by the status quo. But such an ideal of non-elitist milieus will only prove itself over a long period. While we claim the right to search for alternatives, we don't intend to let the rewards of the system remain largely in male hands. Women artists have only recently emerged from the underground (the real underground, not the slick storied underground of the 60's) waging concerted political actions. Our future is to maintain this political action and energy. Nancy Spero New York, Feb. 1976
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