Discipline: Visual Art

Anita Steckel

Discipline: Visual Art
Region: New York, NY
MacDowell Fellowships: 1966
More: www.artforum.com/print/201206/anita-steckel-31080
Anita Steckel (1930–2012) was an American feminist artist known for paintings and photomontages with sexual imagery. She was also the founder of the arts organization The Fight Censorship Group. Steckel began showing her work in both solo and group exhibitions beginning in the late 1960s. In her "Giant Woman" series of works, Steckel painted oversized nude women onto photographs of city scenes, an idea associated with a Women's movement theme that women had "outgrown their roles" in society as previously defined. In 1972, her work was exhibited at the Women's Interart Center in New York. Steckel came to public attention after her solo exhibition, “The Sexual Politics of Feminist Art,” held at Rockland Community College in 1973. The exhibition was controversial because Steckel's work was sexually explicit and some local authorities called for the closure of the show. She created a series of artworks concerning erections, in defense of which she said, “If the erect penis is not wholesome enough to go into museums, it should not be considered wholesome enough to go into women.” She also created a series in 1963 which she called "mom art," in reaction to pop art.

Studios

Cheney

Anita Steckel worked in the Cheney studio.

Cheney Studio was given to MacDowell by Mrs. Benjamin P. Cheney and Mrs. Karl Kauffman. Like Barnard Studio, Cheney is a low, broadly massed bungalow. Sited on a steep westward slope, its porches are supported on wooden posts and fieldstone with lattices. Although it still retains its appealing character, the original design of the shingled building…

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