Impact case study database

Mahon’s work challenges the orthodox history of the avant-garde, notably Surrealism, which has centred on white male European artists. Women are discussed by the majority of scholars and museums only as muses, lovers, and marginalized presences. High profile public exhibitions and events have raised the status of the work of women artists and have demonstrated how their recognition and inclusion is crucial for the history and appreciation of the aesthetic, socio-political, and emphatically collective ambitions of the avant-garde. As a result, new audiences have discovered women artists while museums, collectors, and critics have been catalysed into a newfound appreciation of their art.

Persuading Museums to Exhibit More Women Artists

At the Museum of Sex Mahon brought Fini’s body of erotic art, especially works which challenged sexual hierarchies and gender binaries, to new audiences as well as empowering the typical visitor for this museum – ‘60% female and female-identifying individuals … looking to find new ways to express their desires or seek information about their own bodies’ [E4]. The first museum show of Fini in the US, it was attended by over 150,000 visitors, and named one of the top ten exhibitions of 2018 by Art News. This led the Weinstein Gallery to receive ‘more inquiries of acquisition for Leonor Fini’s work than any other artist’ [E4].

The Reina Sofia invited Mahon to curate a major Tanning exhibition as part of their commitment to avant-garde women artists ‘whose voices were silenced by the historical periods in which they lived’ [E1]. In press meetings, the Director spoke of the ‘great necessity’ for this overdue Tanning exhibition. The Spanish Minister of Culture and Sport praised the Tanning exhibition for supporting the Reina Sofia’s aim to ‘reformulate and reactivate the legacy of modernity’ [E2]. He noted that the Reina Sofia and Tate Modern relied on Mahon’s ‘extensive scholarship’, and he pointed to the collaboration of Mahon, the two museums, and the Spanish government as a ‘model of institutional cooperation’ [E2]. The retrospective received 429,000 visitors at the Reina Sofia and made a profit of EUR839,508 [E1]. Mahon spearheaded a lively public programme – public curator tours, and interactive workshops for teenagers exploring movement and Tanning’s poetry within the exhibition galleries.

At Tate Modern, Dorothea Tanning attracted 115,000 visitors, with a significant increase in Tate membership [E3]. It was named one of the top ten exhibitions of 2019 in The Guardian. [E5] 6,503 copies of Mahon’s edited Dorothea Tanning catalogue were sold at the Tate and 1,642 at the Reina Sophia (1,150 in Spanish, 492 in English). It helped prove the museum’s new commitment to underrepresented women artists. The Director of the Tate Modern testified to Mahon’s ‘acute, intelligent and committed cultural vision’ in bringing one of the first women artist shows to Tate Modern and ensuring ‘a talented and visionary artist who had long been overshadowed by her husband, the surrealist Max Ernst’ was redressed. It enabled five works by Tanning from the Tate collection to be showcased anew and shed ‘fresh light on our understanding of surrealism and pointing to a broader geographical and historical scope of surrealist practice’ [E3]. Mahon led two public curator’s tours, a public conversation with Tanning’s niece, Mimi Johnson, and an event on Tanning’s Family portrait; all sold out. She made a TateShots video on Tanning (7 mins) which has received over 290,000 views [E9, p. 203]. One viewer commented: ‘This just goes to show how sexist the world is that I didn’t learn about this supremely talented artist back when I was an art major some time ago. Learned all about the usual boys, but not her. Crazy’ [E9, p. 241].

Elevating Women Artists in the Eye of Critics and the Public

Both exhibitions were met with overwhelmingly positive responses in the international press. With Leonor Fini, a reviewer in Artforum noted ‘Today, MOMA has no paintings by Fini in its collection. It has 283 by Ernst … That this retrospective is held at the Museum of Sex underscores institutional art history’s missed encounter with Fini’s work’ [E4, p.187]. Le Temps wrote ‘I had never heard of Leonor Fini before I entered the Museum of Sex and I noticed that it was really the first time that I saw the feminine represented in this way by an artist of that time’ [E4, pp. 1-2]. The Art Newspaper invited Mahon to do a podcast interview on Fini in Nov. 2018; it has had 6,400 listeners to date. In Nov. 2020, Katy Hessel of The great women artists podcast invited Mahon to do a further podcast on Fini. It has had over 10,000 listeners to date [E6].

The Tanning retrospective was also perceived by the press and public as ‘rescuing’ an artist from the art historical obscurity to which she had been consigned because of her gender. A review in El Norte de Castilla was given the subtitle: ‘The Reina Sofia has claimed the genius of a multi-talented, original artist excluded from the canon’; while El País called Tanning a ‘woman surrealist against patriarchy’ [E8, pp. 91 and 22]. The Guardian gave it a rare five-star review, noting ‘it’s easy to give Tanning a crucial place in the canon of feminist art’ [E9, p. 26]. ARTnews described it as ‘a superb Dorothea Tanning retrospective connected with present (and surely, future) controversies over sexism’ [E9, p. 185]. Many commentators noted the nature of ‘discovery’ round the exhibition: it was described as a ‘nonstop revelation’ ( The Observer) [E9, p. 101], ‘an exciting revelation’ ( The Brooklyn Rail) [E9, p. 145], an ‘absolute revelation’ ( The Arts Desk), a ‘revelatory exhibition’ ( Europhile) [E9, p. 168] and a ‘feast of surprises’ ( The Sunday Times) [E9, p. 103]. The exhibition was featured in specialist dance and fashion publications including The Dancing Times, Dance International, Vogue, Vanity Fair, Stylist and a Whistles blog [E9, pp. 30; 197; 75; 99; 130; 109]. It inspired a fashion shoot in The Financial Times – ‘10 ways to dress like a surrealist Artist’ – and even a new hairstyle, invented by the London-based stylist Daniel Dyer [E11].

Celebrating Difference and Serving Diverse Audiences

Mahon’s exhibitions presented Fini and Tanning as exemplary of the ‘modern woman’, as noted by critics and the public. Leonor Fini was hailed in The Art Newspaper as ‘a joyful exploration of freedom, creativity and gender non-conformity’. David Noh wrote in Gay City News, ‘If and when I die, I would love to be resurrected in a world created by Leonor Fini — a realm where it is the female who is all powerful, holding complete yet salubrious sway over all men, being more nurturing, empathetic, infinitely sagacious, and rather more beauty-loving than the true weaker sex, exemplified by the treasurable show Leonor Fini: The Theater of Desire’ [E4, p. 176].

Tate shared several Instagram posts on the Tanning exhibition, which accrued a collective 233,214 likes and where comments repeatedly featured the words: ‘amazing’, ‘fabulous’, ‘fantastic’, ‘stunning’ ‘inspiring’. One Instagrammer commented: ‘Genuinely one of the best exhibitions I’ve seen. Thank you’. There were private viewings for Brad Pitt and Madonna who publicized the show to her 14,100,000 Instagram followers and credited Tanning with providing inspiration for her most recent incarnation: Madame X [E12, p. 8]. Tanning’s depictions of motherhood, in particular, touched visitors. The author of an article in Oh Comely magazine said: ‘The first time I saw [ Maternity, 1946] at Museo Reina Sofia, I felt a deep connection with it and my own internal debate about motherhood’ [E9, p. 36], while a piece in Elephant Magazine said: ‘At Dorothea Tanning’s exhibition at Tate Modern, it comes as a great relief to see motherhood depicted in nightmarish glory … Seeing this kind of depiction hanging in a major museum is vital’ [E9, p. 183]. An article on the healing effect of art on mental health in Dazed cited the Tanning retrospective in particular: ‘I feel a confusing juxtaposition of restless and disengaged; my palms are sweaty and there’s a risk I might vomit. I soothe myself by remembering that in an hour or thereabouts, I can skip over Millennium Bridge to Tate Modern and lose myself in [Tanning’s] “Endgame”...’ [E9, p. 176]. Mahon also spoke on ‘Women, Sex and Surrealism’ at the Doyce Street Studios’ pop-up exhibition (1-7 May 2019) organised by ‘a group of diverse artists’ and celebrating ‘beauty and sex and a sisterhood’ in response to Tanning [E7].

Increasing the Market Value of Women Artists’ Work to Museums and Collectors

Mahon’s research on women Surrealists, notably Fini and Tanning, reached new audiences through her public talks at museums and auction houses and media coverage: MoSEX (2018), the Reina Sofia Madrid (2018), Tate Modern, London (2019), Fondation Giacometti, Paris (2019), Witte de With, Rotterdam (2019), Fine Art Museum, Sedona (2019) Christie’s, Paris (2018, 2019). Mahon shared her research and promoted women Surrealists in a number of podcasts (three times for The Art Newspaper), and was prominently featured in a 2019 ARTE documentary on women Surrealists, Gelebte Träume (52 mins) [E6]. In 2020 a record price of USD980,000 for Fini was achieved at Sotheby’s and Weinstein Gallery notes that between 2018-2020, ‘From the website Artsy alone, we receive 3-5 inquiries from curious collectors per week. In most all cases, they have only recently learned of the artist’ [E4]. In 2018 Fine Arts Brokers noted a dramatic increase in prices for Tanning with The temptation of St Antony (1945-46) selling for USD1,152,500 [E10, p. 6]. Gallerist Alison Jacques, noted the impact of Tanning’s ‘well deserved retrospective at the Tate Modern last year … [now] her paintings can command prices between USD75,000 and $1m’ [E10, p. 11]. Further, Mahon advised Reina Sofia on the acquisition of 4 works – Hôtel (1988, collage), Étreinte (1969, sculpture), Even the young girls (1966, painting), Les 7 Périls Spectraux (1959, lithograph) – and National Galleries of Scotland on their bid to the Art Fund to purchase Tableau Vivant (1954). In 2020, Tate bought Murmurs (1976) and MOMA Notes for an apocalypse (1976) – both paintings featured in Mahon’s exhibition.