Jennifer Higgie’s illuminating history of women’s self-portraits, The Mirror and the Palette, covers 500 years of women and their artwork from around the globe, casting an eye over the lives and works of artists whose stories have often been forgotten in favour of their male counterparts. Jennifer Higgie speaks with writer and critic Lana Lopesi (author of Bloody Woman) about the contemporary phenomenon of 20th Century artist Hilma af Klint, whose paintings are currently exhibited at City Gallery Wellington, and the wider work of illuminating women across our art history.
Jennifer Higgie
Australia
Jennifer Higgie is an Australian writer who lives in London. She has a BA in Fine Art from the Canberra School of Art, and a MA from Victoria College of the Arts, Melbourne; her paintings are in various public and private collections in Australia. Previously the editor of frieze magazine, she is now frieze editor-at-large and the presenter of Bow Down, a podcast about women in art history. She is also a screenwriter, the editor of a collection of writings on art and humour The Artist's Joke, a novel, Bedlam, and a children's book, There's Not One.
Lana Lopesi
Aotearoa / NZ
Lana Lopesi is an author, art critic, editor and multidisciplinary researcher based in Tāmaki Makaurau. Since 2012 Lana has published extensively on New Zealand art and culture in local and international publications including Metro magazine, Pantograph Punch, Bulletin, Art New Zealand, The Spinoff, and Paperboy, among many others. Her writing has also been included in books such as Routledge Companion to Art in the Public Realm, Crafting Aotearoa (Te Papa Press) and Say Something: Jacqueline Fahey (Christchurch Art Gallery). In 2018 Lana published her debut book False Divides (BWB Texts) and in 2019 she co-edited the book Transits and Returns (Vancouver Art Gallery; Institute of Modern Art).
