The unsaid: methodological reflection about research on art and feminism

Abstract

In this article we will discuss the steps taken in the investigation "Gender policies in the current art of Lleida", a feminist research work carried out in 2008. We will explore the possibilities and difficulties of life stories in a research process on art and feminism, and we will explain how this narrative methodology situated the scenario of investigation in multiple tensions. Aspects such as the uncertainty that caused the feminist conceptual framework; my own personal involvement; and the tension between what is desired to be counted and what is not counted because it is private, secret or because it lies dormant, hindered the process while at the time it enabled its development and results. Thanks to the concept of the paradox of the feminine/feminist subject offered to us by the poststructuralist feminisms, we will decipher the methodological tensions that were at the same time the condition of possibility for the investigation.