Pop Quiz

The posters in the MACBA Collection are part of the compilation of works in the Guerrilla Girls Talk Back portfolio, one of two produced by the Guerrilla Girls with this title. The first, Guerrilla Girls Talk Back: The First Five Years, 1985–1990, brings together the group’s earliest works: the posters that were plastered over the street walls of lower Manhattan. Their later posters were published under the title Guerrilla Girls Talk Back: Portfolio 2. The works in the MACBA Collection are part of this second portfolio.

In the eighties, the Guerrilla Girls decided to incorporate new strategies to the feminism of the seventies, such as humour and stridence, wit and laughter. Although still influenced by the pioneering work of artists such as Judy Chicago and art critic Lucy Lippard denouncing the invisibility of women in the art world, the fresh language used by the Guerrilla Girls to address the public at large can be seen as a turning point. The posters in the MACBA Collection are representative of this new language. They incorporate icons and elements from popular culture, such as Andy Warhol’s bananas and the figure of King Kong, as well as portraits of women artists and Hollywood actresses. The text looms large, but is used in the form of a question or metaphor, in the first person, or combined with succinct but forceful statistical data. With their own direct approach using techniques drawn from advertising and making full use of collage, they made the colour yellow an identifying feature, as well as pink, although this was used in a contrary way. Adopting the strategies of so-called ‘guerrilla’ communication, they use elements designed to reach a wide public and ensure that their messages are heard.