-["Frida" VO] There's nothing worse than the word

"art appreciation."

It implies that you're
just there awestruck,

and whatever you're
being fed, you appreciate.

Art really is about
discourse and about discussion.

-["Frida"] Do you have any
ideas what museums could be?

-Decolonizing museums.

Like, not having stolen things.

-If your art is for the public,
then the public should have a

right to express
their opinions and views.

-As a young artist, like,
sometimes I see things and,

like, get so frustrated and
feel like nothing has changed.

♪♪♪

-["Frida" VO]
From the very beginning,

we have been
fighting against sexism,

racism, and the death
hold that wealthy people

and wealthy institutions
have on art and culture.

-40 million dollars, 1-5-0-6.

-The Guerrilla Girls will
complain about anything that

pisses them off, and they always
do it in an unexpected way.

-[Coco VO] What the artist has
to say about things other than

his or her art has not always
been considered that important

by the arbiters
of the art world.

And the Guerrilla Girls were
at the forefront of doing that

starting in the 1980s.

-[Frances] The power of the Guerrilla
Girls' work was that whenever I

looked at their
material, I felt implicated.

It wasn't somebody else's
problem, it was my problem.

♪♪♪

-["Frida"] I'm one of
the founding members of the

Guerrilla Girls, and I've
been involved in just about

everything the Guerrilla
Girls have done since 1985.

I'm kind of a lifer.

But I am, in my
real life, an artist.

-["Käthe"] And I'm also a
founder of the Guerrilla Girls

and also a lifelong
political artist.

♪elegant orchestral music♪

In fall of 1984, the Museum of
Modern Art did this exhibition

– an international survey
of painting and sculpture.

There were 169
artists in the show,

and only 17 women, and
very few artists of color.

And women artists in New
York were really pissed off.

♪aggressive rock music♪

-["Frida"] We were educated
to sort of respect all

the institutions and the people
that were making decisions and

the people who were
writing art history,

but it dawned on us that it was
filled with its own biases and

limitations.

-["Käthe"] We're marching
in a picket line in front of

the Museum of Modern Art, and
we realize not one person going

into the museum cares.

[music slows to a stop]

And that was the "aha" moment.

It was so clear that
there had to be a better way

to convince people and
make them understand how much

discrimination there really was
– both racism and sexism –

in the art world.

♪moody synth music♪

-Most of the women who are doing
all the bitching are completely talentless.

For example, like,
the top women artists,

you don't hear them making these
embarrassing feminist pleas.

-["Frida"] The more we
looked at the numbers,

we realized that there was a
systematic elimination of women

and artists of color from the
so-called mainstream of the art world.

-[Guerrilla Girl] What does it
mean that museums are getting

subsidies and have no
obligations to be ethnically diverse?

-["Frida"] We thought it
would be really important to

just state the facts

and see what people
did with the facts.

We met at my loft, and we were
just a hodgepodge of artists.

We called ourselves "the
Guerrilla Girls" because we had

to become anonymous to
say what was obvious.

♪♪♪

Kathë and I came up
with the two first posters.

The very first poster was this
list of male artists who allowed

their work to be shown in
galleries that showed fewer than

10 percent women or none at all.

-[Kathë VO] When one
worked, we would do another.

When another worked,
we would do another.

The facts are a hugely
important part of it.

But also, we had this
kind of outrageous,

in-your-face design and crazy
headlines that you couldn't

totally ignore.

We passed the hat
around to pay for printing.

We were sneaking around New
York in the middle of the night

putting these things up.

And people saw them
and all hell broke loose.

♪energizing
electronic music♪

We mostly did them in
SoHo and the East Village,

which were the big art
neighborhoods of that time.

So we put these posters up on
the gallery windows right below

the name of the gallery.

♪♪♪

-["Frida" VO] It was so 
exciting to go out the next day

and to see a
dialogue being ignited.

♪♪♪

I remember a gallery director
came by with her son,

and he singsong-edly sang,

"Mommy, why is
your name up there?"

[laughs]

-If you look at the art schools,
at least half of them are women.

So what happens to these women?

Where do they go?

But that's not the art
world discriminating,

that's their choices.

♪ethereal synth music♪

-["Frida" VO] The advantages
of being a woman artist:

Working without
the pressure of success.

Not having to be
in shows with men.

Having a relief from the art
world with your four freelance jobs.

Being reassured
that whatever work you make,

it will be labeled "feminine."

Knowing your career might
pick up after you're 80.

Over the years, about 60 people
were in and out of the group.

Collaboration was
wonderful when it worked.

It was painful
when it didn't work.

We didn't understand
where it would go,

but we knew that
what we were saying,

moment to moment,

was something
that was irrefutable.

♪♪♪

-I'm kind of new on the 
scene here but I love it.

-["Frida"] Well, do you ever
think to count how many women,

how many artists of color?

-[woman] Oh, absolutely.
-["Frida"] Yeah.

And does that change
your attitude or your idea?

-[woman] It has a
lot, and the idea,

I think that's
why maybe my

mother and grandmother were
never really that interested.

Because they didn't see anything
that was done by people that

looked like them.

♪sparse ethereal music♪

-["Frida" VO] I always
felt distance from the

socioeconomics in the art world.

I grew up in Pittsburgh
in a working-class family.

There was a lot of trauma in
my family with parents dying

and getting sick, and I
had a lot to take care of,

so I really never felt
the freedom to rebel

in my adolescence.

-["Käthe" VO] I grew
up in New York City.

I was an activist in my teens,

and I got kicked out of college
for being in a demonstration,

and that kind of
pushing the envelope

has always been my life, and
it's always been the kind of art

I do.

♪♪♪

-["Frida"] I was always
uncomfortable with this idea

that there was a
level playing field,

because it was not my experience
in life or in the art world.

So the minute I felt
the freedom to criticize it,

it was wonderful, it was great,
it opened up a whole part of my brain.

♪quirky upbeat music♪

-["Käthe"] I couldn't stop.

I can't explain why,
but I couldn't stop.

And it became as important to
me as anything else I did in my life.

♪♪♪

-["Käthe"] Those of us who
were unfairly left out of

the system, it was like
a breath of fresh air.

It was so-- it seemed
daring, it seemed exciting,

and the people on the
posters were really pissed off.

-[Guerrilla Girl] They now feel
they have to contend with us as

a power.

And it's very bizarre to be at a
point where I get more respect

with a gorilla mask on
than I get with it off.

♪energetic percussion♪

-[Frances VO] In 2006, we
had, at The Tate Modern,

a small room with a group of
the Guerrilla Girls' posters.

But I was put on the back foot
by journalists grilling me about

precisely what the Guerrilla
Girls were charging us with –

lack of representation
of women artists,

lack of diversity –

and I had no way
of responding.

My inability to respond was
published in The Guardian.

I felt profoundly
exposed, profoundly embarrassed.

And in that moment, the
Guerrilla Girls' wonderful pink

letter really resonated with me
-- that idea that I had agency

in this and I had to
take some responsibility.

-["Frida" VO]
[echoing] Dearest art collector,

it has come to our
attention that your collection,

like most, does not
contain enough art by women.

We know that you feel
terrible about this

and will rectify the
situation immediately.

All our love, Guerrilla Girls.

-[Frances VO] About a year later, I took over
the leadership of building the

international collection,
and I presented a strategy to

massively broaden the
diversity of the collection,

and to really address the
representation of women.

That moment with the
Guerrilla Girls was profoundly influential.

♪♪♪

-["Frida" VO] There are
wonderful individuals on the

inside trying to change things.

But there is a
corporate, capitalist,

institutional structure that's
connected to much larger forces.

-["Zubeida"] Right now, art
institutions do not get enough

government funding, and so
they're reliant on individuals

to donate to them to make
art exhibitions happen.

A lot of the people are very
wealthy individuals for whom art

is an investment asset, and so
they will support exhibitions

that raise the value of
their art collection.

I feel like in
any other industry,

that would be considered
insider trading or something,

but it's not.

-["Frida" VO] [echoing]
Guerrilla Girls' Code of Ethics

for Art Museums:

Thou shalt not give more than
three retrospectives to any

artist whose dealer is the
brother of the chief curator.

Thou shalt provide lavish
funerals for women and artists

of color, who thou planneth to
exhibit only after their death.

-[Käthe VO] We did a whole
series of these posters.

After many years, we thought it
would be great to do an updated

version and build
the actual monument

and drag it around to every
museum we could possibly get to.

-["Frida" VO] [echoing] Thou
shalt honor all thine employees,

never undermine
their efforts to unionize,

and pay them a living wage.

Thou shalt banish board members
who make the world a worse place.

If thou exhibiteth
super-expensive art bought at

super-fancy galleries and
donated by super-rich collectors

for super-big tax deductions,
thou must renameth thyself

The Museum of
Super-Rich People's Art.

-[Käthe] Everybody,
this is a monument we think

needs to be outside
every single museum.

So who wants to talk?

-The public has
no say whatsoever;

they just go and
look at the art.

What these museums are doing is
they've basically turned it into

a business.

-[Käthe] You are now
an honorary Guerrilla Girl.

-[man] Oh, really?
-[Käthe] Yes.

-Thank you.

-Now, I think, in a lot
of these institutions,

they've, like, clung onto the
fact that it's trendy to be,

like, putting art out there that
is promoting social justice,

but when you look at what
they're actually doing in

practice, it doesn't
support those ideals.

-["Frida"] Oh, I agree.

We think that trustees should
be chosen who make the world a

better place.

What did you see in
the museum today?

-Oh, we didn't go in.
-We are yet to go in.

-We came to meet you first.
-["Frida"] [gasps]

-Yeah.
-["Frida"] Oh, that's so great!

-[woman] Yeah, we saw
it on your Instagram!

-["Frida"]
Thank you so much!

-I consider my
art Guerrilla art.

Well, like, I, like, put a
poster up in my city in India

and stuff like that
about mental health.

-["Frida"] That's wonderful!
-["Käthe"] Fantastic.

-This is great.
Oh my gosh.

-[woman] Thank you,
thank you so much!

-I took, like, 15.
-Aw, thank you.

-["Käthe"] We've been so
lucky that people all over the

world want our work.

♪ambient
oscillating synths♪

-["Zubeida" VO] The
Guerrilla Girls' work has always

been statistics.

People don't believe you unless
you show them the numbers.

♪♪♪

Without the numbers, you really
have a false sense of diversity.

-["Frida" VO] For the
last 20, 25, 30 years,

we get people saying to us,

"I never knew this before."

Our stuff is easy to understand,

and then you take off with it on your own.

-I've been teaching
now for almost 30 years.

I make sure that my students are
aware of the Guerrilla Girls' contributions.

They get museum
shows in Europe,

not so much in
the United States.

I think that that's an
indication of the resistance

still to the practice and to the
message of the Guerrilla Girls,

despite the fact that
there are probably, you know,

200 art history majors writing
papers on them right now.

-["Zubeida" VO] One of the
most exciting things for me has

been the shift where the younger
generation are learning about

the Guerrilla Girls earlier
and earlier -- in high school,

or they saw the
work on social media.

It gives me a lot of hope.

It gives me a lot of hope.

-["Frida"] Bye-bye!

And I hope you find things
that you love to look at!

Can't we think about
art as not being about

winners, but about something
that we all need in our lives?

Thank you so much, and good
luck with your own work!

-[man] This is a big
moment in my life!

Yay!

-["Frida"] There are so
many cultural traditions where

art is collective, and
it's done in a community,

and artists work together.

They might do individual work,

but they somehow present a
kinder idea of what it means

to have a creative life.

♪♪♪

["Käthe"] Come over!

♪ ethereal ambient music ♪