Drawing art out of the shadows: Institutional strategies for incorporating and increasing art by women into art museum collections

Gender disparity within institutions is still an apparent issue in the art world today. A look at the current state of art museum collections throughout the country was surveyed in order to compare and prove the gender disparity that still exists. From here, interviews were conducted with four arts professionals in the curatorial and administration fields that commented on methods and approaches various institutions have done and should practice moving forward in order to close this gender gap in collections and art works on view in museums. Two institutions had recently, in the last decade, made important strategic moves to close the gender gap. Their methods were evaluated and compared with the interviews to create recommendations for strategic methods institutions can use to enable them to be leaders in the art world, while fully representing the art history. The research found successful integration of work by women within the collections by reinterpretation, as well as expanding the notion of high art within the field are both successful and affective ways to close the gender gap in art collections.M.S., Arts Administration -- Drexel University, 201