Annie Morris, Stack 10, Copper Blue
There are easily a dozen paintings in Victoria Miro’s latest sensational show Surface Work that I wanted to smuggle home. Over 50 female abstract artists from across the globe over the past century are shown in this stunning, historical glimpse at what women painters were creating while names like Kandinsky, Pollock and Rothko were stealing the headlines.
The show’s title comes from the late abstract expressionist Joan Mitchell, who said
“Abstract is not a style. I simply want to make a surface work.”
Liubov Popova
The earliest work was made in 1918 by Liubov Popova, a commanding figure in early Abstract Expressions. She was born in 1889 in Russia, showed with Malevich at the age of 26 and died of scarlet fever in 1924, aged 35. I want!
The latest work in the show was made this year, by Brazilian artist Adriana Varejão (b. 1964).
Azulejão (Moon), Adriana Varejão
Azulejão (Moon) is one of Varejão’s celebrated ‘cracked tile’ works reference the history of Portuguese Azulejo tile work and the disturbing legacy of Brazil’s colonial past.
Every decade gets represented in Surface Work, which takes place across Victoria Miro’s two London galleries. While blue chip names like Lee Krasner, Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, Yayoi Kusama and Agnes Martin are all here – mainly at Miro’s Mayfair gallery – plenty of lesser-known talents, both old and young, get wall space.
Take African-American activist and artist Betty Blayton (1937-2016) who championed the arts in Harlem and was a founding member of the Studio Museum in Harlem (which is currently getting a massive new David Adjaye-designed headquarters).
Betty Blayton Hard Edge Three Intermezzo 1969
Alma Thomas’s (1892-1978) untitled painting below was painted in 1971 and inspired by the Apollo moon landings. Thomas was the first African-American woman to receive a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York in 1972.
Alma Thomas Untitled 1961
I love reading the snippets about these artists almost as much as looking at their work. British abstract artist Sandra Blow (1925-2006) used things like tea, sawdust and sackcloth in her work. American Howardena Pindell (b. 1943) opted for glitter, talcum powder and perfume. Japanese-Brazilian Tomie Ohtake (1913-2015) painted while blindfolded. Bay Area artist Jay DeFeo (1929-1989) is best known for her painting The Rose, a one-tonne, ten foot tall painting made up of layers and layers of oil paint applied to canvas. It was so heavy that it had to be removed from her apartment by a forklift truck.
Fast forward to now American superstar Lynda Benglis (b. 1941) transforms chicken wire and glitter into something floating, lovely and slightly puzzling.
Lynda Benglis Tres (Shy Five) 2016
Victoria Miro’s Wharf Road space shows the younger, more affordable artists. Run, don’t walk to Hoxton as this show closes May 19th and not all of the glorious works are sold, like this exuberant work from relentlessly inventive British painter Fiona Rae (b. 1963)…
Fiona Rae Sleeping Beauty Will Hum About Mine Ears 2017
Rae is a Professor of Painting at the Royal Academy Schools, one of the first two female professors since the Academy was founded in 1768. Of this work, she says:
“I’m inventing characters… who exist only as abstract paint marks, but who might be wearing crowns, clouds, arrows, dresses, shoes, hats, feathers, stars… I think of these paintings as having a relationship to the way one presents oneself to the world; the way one might use costume and props as bits of language to hang off the body.’
Hungarian-American Rita Ackermann (b. 1968) painted the below. I love the whirlpools of pink and red.
Rita Ackermann
As Helen Frankenthaler (1928-2011) once said, ‘A really good picture looks as if it’s happened at once. It’s an immediate image.
More from Elena on her own excellent travel blog here. More on Surface Work at Victoria Miro here
The failure mode is always the same, the thing was composed at slide dimensions and then squeezed into a banner or a square. Starting in a graphical abstract maker at the target ratio avoids the amputated labels, and the labels are where the review time should go anyway.
What a lovely reminder of how many women were doing bold abstract work long before the art world bothered to notice them. I kept thinking about how a simple shift in what gets shown can completely change the story, kind of like converting mmol/l to mg/dl and suddenly seeing the same number in a new light.
incredible! I love how it brings attention to so many talented female abstract level devil – not a troll game artists who were often overlooked. The variety of techniques and stories behind the works makes the show especially fascinating.
I love how Elena Bowes pairs the famous names—Krasner, Frankenthaler, Mitchell—with lesser-known figures like Betty Blayton and Alma Thomas, giving a fuller picture of women’s abstract art. The small anecdotes, such as Jay DeFeo’s one-ton painting requiring a forklift or Tomie Ohtake painting blindfolded, make the exhibition feel vivid and personal. It’s a refreshing reminder of how much talent was overlooked while the usual male stars dominated.
The range of stories behind these works is fascinating, especially Jay DeFeo’s one-tonne *The Rose* needing a forklift to leave her apartment. Fiona Rae’s idea of abstract characters wearing “crowns, clouds, arrows” also makes her painting feel surprisingly theatrical. On a practical note, I sometimes use handwritten signature generator when I need personalized handwritten signature ideas for artwork labels or notes.
What a fascinating overview of female abstract artists! I particularly loved learning about Liubov Popova’s too-short career and the story of Jay DeFeo’s monumental painting The Rose that required a forklift to remove from her apartment. It’s wonderful to see Victoria Miro giving space to these overlooked talents alongside the blue-chip names. For those interested in exploring more rich artistic heritage, MyAsiaTrip has a great guide to Asian heritage and cultural experiences that might inspire your next cultural journey.
The detail about Liubov Popova showing with Malevich at just 26 years old really struck me – it’s incredible to think about the artistic landscape in Russia a century ago. The show’s range from her 1918 work to Adriana Varejão’s 2018 piece really demonstrates how female abstract artists have been creating groundbreaking work across continents for over a hundred years. flags of the world
What a fascinating overview of female abstract artists across the century! The inclusion ofLiubov Popova’s pioneering work from 1918 alongside contemporary artists like Adriana Varejão really illustrates how this exhibition spans such a rich timeline of artistic innovation. Beijing’s 798 Art District
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The article’s discussion of abstract compositions really got me thinking about visual balance and structure, which is a fun contrast to my usual deep dive into facial proportions and symmetry on PSL Scale. It’s refreshing to step back from analyzing jawlines and bone structure for a while.
Elena’s review of the Surface Work exhibition at Victoria Miro is wonderfully perceptive! Exploring abstract art and female artists’ tactile compositions is truly inspiring. Transforming still gallery captures and artwork details into fluid video stories using PicWav Animate Photo offers a fresh perspective for visual storytelling. Thank you for this cultural highlight!
Ett mycket vackert och inspirerande budskap som sprider lugn och eftertanke. Att bevara minnesvärda ögonblick och ge liv åt vackra bilder genom att Turn Photo into Video hjälper verkligen till att förmedla varma känslor och skapa meningsfulla visuella berättelser. Tack för denna fina vägledning!
Elena’s piece on Surface Work at Victoria Miro beautifully captures the vibrancy of these overlooked female abstract artists. It’s striking how many of these women used unconventional materials—sawdust, glitter, perfume—to challenge the male-dominated canon. That same spirit of reclaiming narrative and form lives on in other media, too. For those who enjoy immersive, women-led storytelling, there’s a lovely curated directory of free otome visual novels that feels like a natural extension of this creative lineage. Each game is reviewed and playable instantly in the browser, no downloads needed.
I thoroughly enjoyed Elena Bowes’s tour of Surface Work at Victoria Miro—the sheer range of female abstract artists, from Liubov Popova to Fiona Rae, is staggering. The way these artists experimented with layering, texture, and mark-making feels surprisingly relevant to contemporary craft techniques. For instance, Sandra Blow’s use of unconventional materials or Jay DeFeo’s monumental layers echo the kind of creative problem-solving that goes into designing multi-layer stencils. If you’re inspired to try your own hand at translating abstract forms into something tangible, photo to stencil converter can turn any image or text into a cut-ready stencil for spray paint, Cricut, or even pumpkin carving. It’s a neat way to bring a bit of that abstract spirit into DIY projects.
I thoroughly enjoyed this piece on Surface Work—it’s refreshing to see so many female abstract artists finally getting the recognition they deserve. The fact that the show spans over a century and includes lesser-known figures like Betty Blayton and Alma Thomas is particularly striking. It got me thinking about how we can continue to explore these artistic connections beyond the gallery walls. If you’re interested in tracing links between artists, movements, and ideas, you might enjoy art history Wikipedia race. It’s a free browser game where you race from one Wikipedia article to another, with daily challenges, multiplayer, and hundreds of levels. A fun way to keep the exploration going.
What a rich overview of Surface Work — the historical sweep from Liubov Popova to Fiona Rae really underscores how much these women expanded the language of abstraction. I was particularly struck by the material experiments: Sandra Blow’s tea and sawdust, Howardena Pindell’s glitter and perfume, Jay DeFeo’s monumental The Rose. It’s a reminder that creativity often emerges from the most unexpected places, including interactive media like games. In fact, I’ve been following how Slayers 2 translates artistic inspiration into playable form — the breathing styles are a great example of visual storytelling. For anyone curious about the design behind them, Slayers 2 breathing styles offers a detailed breakdown. The show is a must-see before it closes.
Popova dying at 35 in 1924, yet still landing the earliest piece in a 2018-to-now survey, says a lot about how narrow the standard art history story has been.
GoW Laufey Wiki
This show sounds like a total gem. Who knew there were so many incredible female artists who’ve been overshadowed? For those looking for a deeper dive into art mechanics, check this out archivedtrello.
This show sounds like a total gem. Who knew there were so many incredible female artists who’ve been overshadowed? For those looking for a deeper dive into art mechanics, check this out .
Les travaux de Betty Blayton et Alma Thomas montrent comment l’art abstrait peut capturer des moments historiques précis, tout comme les guides de Birdly Yard aident à repérer les espèces d’oiseaux qui marquent chaque saison dans votre État — une manière concrète d’observer les changements locaux. Découvrez comment identifier ces visiteurs par région avec les guides de Birdly Yard.
Fiona Rae’s description of characters suggested by abstract marks is the part that stayed with me. It gives a different way to look at the crowns, clouds and other details instead of searching for a literal figure. That use of visual cues also interests me in games: water and flame can suggest a character’s identity before a player reads any instructions. I maintain a Slayers 2 breathing guide that takes those style names into the practical side, explaining the trainers and learning routes. Here, though, the glimpses into materials — especially Sandra Blow’s tea and sawdust — make me want to look much more closely at the surfaces themselves.
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What a pleasure to read a proper account of Surface Work — Elena captures exactly what made that show remarkable, that sense of women quietly building entire abstract vocabularies while the headlines went elsewhere. The detail about Jay DeFeo’s The Rose needing a forklift always stops me cold, and it’s a good reminder of how much material labour sits behind a canvas. It also strikes me that these artists’ stories are full of systems: studio rents, gallery commissions, the economics of simply keeping a practice alive. I’ve been poking around a similar nerdy archive of game economics over at Lagos Life job pay data, which catalogues the same kind of behind-the-scenes numbers for anyone who enjoys that angle. Anyway, I’m glad this show got such an attentive write-up before it closed.