Guerrilla Girls: Food for Thought
Upcoming: April 1–August 2, 2026
Forty years ago, in response to the exhibition An International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in which only thirteen of 165 artists were women, a group of artists and creative minds formed an anonymous collective to call attention to art-world inequities.
The collective’s name—the Guerrilla Girls—was inspired by war tactics devised to be irregular, sudden, and often shocking. In their work, each “Girl” adopted anonymity in two ways. First, they assumed the names of female creatives from the past, such as Gertrude Stein, Artemisia Gentileschi, and Zora Neale Hurston, thus giving “new” voice to creative women throughout history. Second, they donned gorilla masks, inspired by an accidental misspelling of the word “guerrilla.”
Over the past four decades, the Guerrilla Girls have protested various forms of corruption through mass-produced works featuring simplistic, yet eye-capturing typography, bright contrasting colors, loaded infographics, and persuasive strategies drawn from advertising, as well as their signature rhetorical and sardonic language. They have extended their message internationally through actions and exhibitions. While their origins stemmed from the art world, their agenda has since expanded to critique sexism, homophobia, and racism in areas such as film, mass culture, economics, and politics. As the collective has stated, “We believe in an intersectional feminism that fights for human rights for all people and all genders.”
On one side of the gallery, ten iconic works are displayed from Guerrilla Girls Portfolio Compleat: 1985–2012, speaking to their first five formative years of practice. On the other side of the gallery, ten contemporary works from the collective’s most recent five years are emphasized. Tracing the collective’s evolution from their earliest interventions to more recent projects, the exhibition highlights the Girls’ iconic beginnings and examines their earliest concerns with the art world in relation to ongoing conversations about representation, equity, and institutional accountability—revealing not only what has changed over the past four decades, but also where meaningful progress remains to be made.
Guerrilla Girls: Food for Thought is organized by the Neuberger Museum of Art and curated by Curatorial Assistant Rebecca Elisabeta Marya (Rem) Ribeiro, with the assistance of three fall 2024 curatorial interns.
Generous support for this exhibition has been provided by the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA) Foundation and the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art.