Guerrilla Girls in the Global South: Feminism, Social Justice, and Political Movement

The denunciation of Guerilla Girls is categorical: the presence of women in museums is greater as inspiring muses and portraits than as artists and art agents. This statement sheds light on a heritage centered on a sexual division of labor in which men are professional artists and women are their models for painting and sculpture. The actions of Guerilla Girls can be understood as a social and political movement that potentiates sociological questions about unequal distribution of power and legitimacy, as well as strengthens feminist struggles in various areas of knowledge and the arts. Immersed in a context of globalization, Guerrilla Girls has used online communication means and connected international institutions to favor the recognition of women artists while investigating the processes of invisibility and erasure of women artists and tensioning representation in museums and art galleries worldwide. The central objective of this study is to understand the processes of emergence and strengthening of Guerilla Girls, the actions and political effects of feminist struggles regarding the agency positioning of women as artists. Additionally, this study also analyzes the notable impacts of changes in the collection at the São Paulo Museum of Art, one of the largest and most renowned museums in Latin America, and in discussions of feminist sociology and art history in the Global South.