68. Old Women: Representations, Resistances, Reasonings.

Just before AAH2025, a tiny Gwen Raverat woodcut appeared at auction: Old Women. The auctioneer presenting the lot said as an aside before opening bidding: ‘You would think they could have given it a better title.’ Close inspection shows the title written by Raverat, under the image, with her signature. In 1974, when a journalist said she did not look so old, Gloria Steinem said, ‘this is what 40 looks like’. In 1982 Louise Bourgeois had her first major solo exhibition, aged 70, inaugurating her 70s/80s/90s as an internationally exhibiting artist. These observations highlight the disjuncture between western culture’s assumptions about what constitutes an old woman, women’s experiences as artists, and representations of old women.

The panel will explore the representation of old women as practitioners, images in artworks, objects of curation; as structural, institutional, presences and absences. What, where, and how does an old woman (artist, image, concept, curator, teacher) look like as post-menopausal life expectancy increases? The panel provides breadth of understanding of what is at stake through selecting diverse 20-minute papers with sharp focus, followed by discussion among panellists and audience.

Speakers should explore particular art works, representational tropes, individual artists of any gender or culture, or specific events. Papers may recognise that artists who were in their 20s during the feminist 1960s-70s are now in their 70s/80s/90s; may focus on contemporary, modern, or earlier images; they may explore the impacts of feminist thinking and politics; contributions may be autoethnographic; they may note the rise of academic interest in witches; or use other pertinent contextualisation.

Themes: Old Women; Feminist analysis; art praxis

Additional format comment: Open discussion at end of session.

Lead Convenor: Hilary Robinson, Loughborough University, United Kingdom

To submit a Paper to this Session, please follow the guidance on our website and complete the AAH 2027 Call for Papers Proposal Submission Form.