Nikoleta Sekulovic
Mary Wollstonecraft, 2023
oil stick, graphite and acrylic on canvas
190 x 170 cm
75 x 67 in
75 x 67 in
Back of painting: Mary Wollstonecraft - Excerpt from 'A Vindication of the Rights of Woman' - (1792) 'Everyone who has written about female education and manners, from Rousseau to Dr...
Back of painting:
Mary Wollstonecraft - Excerpt from 'A Vindication of the Rights of Woman' - (1792)
"Everyone who has written about female education and manners, from Rousseau to Dr Gregory, has helped to make women more artificial, weaker characters than they would otherwise have been...
...I address you as a legislator: When men fight for their freedom, fight to be allowed to judge for themselves concerning their own happiness, isn’t it inconsistent and unjust to hold women down? I know that you firmly believe you are acting in the manner most likely to promote women’s happiness; but who made man the exclusive judge of that if woman shares with him the gift of reason?
Tyrants of every kind, from the weak king to the weak father of a family, use this same argument that ‘It is in your own best interests’. They are all eager to crush reason, but they always say that they usurp reason’s throne only to be useful. Isn’t that what you are doing when you force all women, by denying them civil and political rights, to remain walled in by their families and groping in the dark? Surely, sir, you won’t say that a duty can be binding without being founded on reason! Arguments for civil and political rights can be drawn from reason; and with that splendid support, the more understanding women acquire the more they will be attached to their duty, understanding it. Unless they understand it—unless their morals are based on the same immutable principles as those of man—no authority can make them act virtuously. They may be convenient slaves, but slavery will have its constant effect, degrading the master and the abject dependent..."
Mary Wollstonecraft - Excerpt from 'A Vindication of the Rights of Woman' - (1792)
"Everyone who has written about female education and manners, from Rousseau to Dr Gregory, has helped to make women more artificial, weaker characters than they would otherwise have been...
...I address you as a legislator: When men fight for their freedom, fight to be allowed to judge for themselves concerning their own happiness, isn’t it inconsistent and unjust to hold women down? I know that you firmly believe you are acting in the manner most likely to promote women’s happiness; but who made man the exclusive judge of that if woman shares with him the gift of reason?
Tyrants of every kind, from the weak king to the weak father of a family, use this same argument that ‘It is in your own best interests’. They are all eager to crush reason, but they always say that they usurp reason’s throne only to be useful. Isn’t that what you are doing when you force all women, by denying them civil and political rights, to remain walled in by their families and groping in the dark? Surely, sir, you won’t say that a duty can be binding without being founded on reason! Arguments for civil and political rights can be drawn from reason; and with that splendid support, the more understanding women acquire the more they will be attached to their duty, understanding it. Unless they understand it—unless their morals are based on the same immutable principles as those of man—no authority can make them act virtuously. They may be convenient slaves, but slavery will have its constant effect, degrading the master and the abject dependent..."