200 Works by Female Artists Make a Statement at Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw

The Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw presents "The Woman Question 1550-2025," featuring nearly 200 works by over 130 female artists.

The Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw is making a powerful statement with "The Woman Question 1550-2025," a landmark exhibition featuring nearly 200 works by more than 130 women artists from around the world. Curated by Alison M. Gingeras, the show challenges the myth of women's absence from art history, presenting a continuous narrative of female creativity spanning five centuries.

The exhibition is organized into eight thematic chapters that explore different facets of women's artistic production and experience. Sections include "Femmes Fortes," featuring heroic representations by Artemisia Gentileschi and Angelika Kauffmann; "Palettes & Power," examining the self-portrait as a tool of professional legitimation; and "Education and the Canon," addressing structural barriers that excluded women from academies.

Other sections explore female erotic imagery, surrealism and mysticism, the maternal experience, and women's agency during wartime including works responding to conflicts in Eastern Europe. The exhibition features renowned names such as Frida Kahlo, Tamara de Lempicka, Louise Bourgeois, Tracey Emin, Yoko Ono, Cindy Sherman, and the Guerrilla Girls, alongside historical figures like Sofonisba Anguissola and Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun.

The spatial design by Dorota Terlecka of Biuro Kreacja employs minimalist structures and neutral palettes that deliberately step back, allowing the artwork to speak for itself. "The true success of spatial design lies in creating a feeling where nothing stands in the way of perception," Terlecka explains.

Running concurrently with "The City of Women" a series of four complementary exhibitions curated by other researchers the project offers a comprehensive feminist intervention in art historical discourse. Gingeras reflects: "I hope visitors leave understanding that women's presence in art has never been accidental or marginal, but also never secure. This exhibition does not offer closure; it asks viewers to recognize themselves as participants in an ongoing question rather than observers of a completed past." 

The exhibition runs through May 4, 2026, accompanied by an extensive public program including lectures, film screenings, and educational activities.