A gaze of their own

Allison Zuckerman’s “Woman at Her Toilette” (2017, acrylic and inkjet on canvas) is part of  “Framing the Female Gaze: Women Artists and the New Historicism” (Tuesday, Oct. 10, through Jan. 20 at Lehman College Art Gallery).

In the late-20th and early-21st centuries, an age of cultural appropriation that has seen minorities adapt and reinvent the masterpieces of Western civilization, women artists have reasserted the so-called “female gaze,” not only by creating wholly original works but by reclaiming the art historical canon, either interpolating themselves and women arts leaders into iterations of great paintings or imagining men from a woman’s perspective. 

Art Gallery, and co-curator Georgette Gouveia with a group of works that recast American Ballet Theatre principal Misty Copeland as a Degas ballerina.

A new exhibit at the Lehman College Art Gallery explores this subject through the prism of 19th-century French art. “Framing the Female Gaze: Women Artists and the New Historicism” (Tuesday, Oct. 10, through Jan. 20) features works in various two-dimensional media by some 40 contemporary artists. There’s a related show at Bronx Community College’s Hall of Fame Gallery Thursday, Oct. 12, through Dec. 12.  

Truth in advertising:  I’m one of the curators of the show, along with Lehman College Art Gallery Director Bartholomew F. Bland, Patricia Cazorla and Deborah Yasinsky. We hope you’ll join us for a provocative look at women rethinking art history. The reception for the Lehman College Gallery show is 5 to 8 p.m. Oct. 18 and for the Hall of Fame Gallery exhibit, noon to 3 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 12. 

Reservations are required for the Lehman Gallery reception. For free tickets, click here.   

Otherwise, gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. For more, visit lehmanartgallery.org.