Though the University of Edinburgh does not publish the specific gender breakdown for Edinburgh College of Art (ECA) undergraduate admissions, the latest HESA-derived data reports that in 2024/25 there was an approximately 82 per cent female, 17 per cent male split for fine art and creative design undergraduate students at the ECA. Though this does not include History of Art students, it makes it abundantly clear that the ECA is a predominantly female-dominated undergraduate environment. Whether this is due to gender socialisation as children, or a plethora of other reasons, is a heavily debated topic amongst scholars. Regardless, it is an evident truth that is intriguing and ever-present throughout educational institutions and work environments today.
One quick look at my History of Art Learn page tells me that the majority of my upcoming lectures (or would-be lectures, had it not been for the strikes) primarily concern male artists such as The Limbourg Brothers, Giorgio Vasari, Caravaggio and Bernini. Not only this, but all of my lectures so far have been given by a male lecturer. There seems to be an unfortunate running theme of male voices, male stories, male art and male ‘greatness’ that leads to an exhausted disillusionment as a student, especially as a female student. It is discouraging, making it harder to see oneself in the field of art history if the people teaching, and the people whom they teach about, do not reflect a large part of the student body itself.
Being taught about mostly male artists by mostly male tutors is, without a doubt, largely symptomatic of the way in which the world has developed over time. For millennia, women have not been afforded an education, the space, the time or the financial independence to focus on making art. As Virginia Woolf so aptly put it in A Room of One’s Own: “A woman must have money, and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” or, in my opinion, make any kind of art.
In art, we often speak of ‘the greats’ who, shock-horror, are almost always (white) men. Take Leonardo Da Vinci for example, or Pablo Picasso, or Monet and Van Gogh. But what about all the women (and all the other marginalised groups of people throughout history for that matter) with bright, brilliant minds who were never given the chance to be great? I often think about the many hidden, unknown artists that we do not get taught about, that we do not even know exist, simply because they have been engulfed by the tides of a largely white, patriarchal history.
It is important to remember, however, that despite the fact that it is easy to generalise, over half of my upcoming lecturers for History of Art are women. Additionally, the male professors I have had so far are always passionate, and consistently make a clear effort to recognise their own privileges as male art historians and to unpack the issues around gender and privilege that arise in art historical debates.
“Life Class 1908 Edinburgh College of Art” by AndrewHall1953 is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
