National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies

Andrea Bowers

2017

Acrylic marker on found cardboard

Minneapolis Institute of Art

A stylized figure in armor blows a horn and holds two staffs, with a flowing banner behind them. The artwork is composed of many small, rectangular pieces of cardboard. Andrea Bowers’s work focuses on the nexus between art and activism across a broad range of issues, including workers' rights, sexuality, discrimination, and immigration. The figure of the Bugler Girl represented the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, whose struggle for women’s voting rights in the United Kingdom was known as the Suffragette Movement (1897–1918). While the movement was primarily concerned with the voting rights of white women, here Bowers reimagines the Bugler Girl as a woman of color, transforming the call to action to embrace all women. Gallery Not on View Gift of Mary and Bob Mersky