User:A21sauce/Brainstormers

The Brainstormers are a group of young American women artists whose performances address gender inequity in the US art world. Made up of fellow Hunter MFA graduates Danielle Mysliwiec, Elaine Kaufmann, and Maria Dumlao, their most well-known work is one where they stood in costume, at the entrance of P.S.1 during the Greater New York show in 2005, pointing accusingly at the institution for its gender inequity in its representation of artists.

Point, 2005
In 2005, fellow Hunter MFA graduates, Danielle Mysliwiec, Elaine Kaufmann, Maria Dumlao, Anne Polashenski, and Jane Johnston (the latter two have since left the group ) and four volunteers, stood outside of P.S.1's entrance in a colorful curly wigs their faces painted and stood pointing accusingly at the institution, for six hours. Point was a performance that called attention to the fact of the all-important New York City exhibition's roster of artists being over two-thirds male. The group drew on earlier feminist art protest work of the Guerrilla Girls, with whom they have collaborated.

Other work
In 2005, the Brainstormers performed again, in a piece called How Good Are You? outside the entrance to the Armory Show, dressed in lab coats, handing out color-coded research about the levels of representation of women artists in Chelsea art galleries. In 2008, they did a collaborative work with the Guerilla Girls at the Bronx Museum of Art. Also that year, they protested in the street in Chelsea, at the corner of West 24th Street and 10th Avenue, getting passers-by to fill in mad libs-style postcards protesting about the lack of female representation in art galleries. In 2009 they exhibited at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Center in New York City.

Of the group's work, Dumlao has said "Our work and actions are meant to inform, excite and provoke people in a dialogue. We encourage them to act on their own terms."