In 1985, a group of New York City artists established an activist movement devoted to fighting against deeply rooted misogyny and racism within the art world. They called themselves the “Guerrilla Girls.”
As a celebration of the 40th anniversary of the group’s establishment, the Getty Center unveiled their “How To Be A Guerrilla Girl” exhibition at their Research Institute Galleries.
The exhibition highlights the Getty’s archival collection of Guerrilla Girls materials from 1981–2003, tracing the evolution of their bold and analytical approach to activism. Through posters, publications, and other mixed media, it reveals how the collective successfully raised awareness, cultivated a following, and initiated change within very high-profile cultural scenes in a pre-internet era.
Upon entering the Research Institute, the viewer is met with various acclaimed works within art history. Pieces from the Renaissance and Baroque eras are plastered on the hot pink walls of the entrance, with comic strip speech bubbles coming from their subjects, exposing both the realities of their stories and of the time at which the piece was made, and current realities as well.
“Lucretia” (1627) by Artemisia Gentileschi, one of the few famous female artists noted in European art history, is portrayed alongside her “Self Portrait As the Allegory of Painting” (1627).
Lucretia’s speech bubble reads: “The King’s son raped me and I’m about to kill myself. My death will lead to a revolt and the birth of the Roman Republic. Alas, women will have few rights.”
Artemisia Gentileschi’s figure has been removed from her original self-portrait and positioned beside the painting of Lucretia, making it appear as though she is actively creating the artwork. The artist’s speech bubble reads: “I painted Lucretia’s story because at 17 I was raped, I didn’t take my own life, but I did take the rapist to court and won!” It further says, “Today, 2500 years after Lucretia, 1 in 5 American women say they have been raped.”
This critical perspective on these historically celebrated works offers a window into the exhibition’s broader narrative, highlighting the Guerrilla Girls’ ongoing mission to expose historical hypocrisies and the injustices that persist today through their satirical, witty pop-art posters.
“Guerrilla” is defined within the exhibition as “a member of a small independent group engaged in irregular fighting, typically against larger regular forces.” The group adopted the name, as they utilized guerrilla tactics of surprise and small-scale actions of resistance, in order to fight against the global issue of a lack of representation in the art world. One member mistakenly heard the term as “gorilla,” so the collective embraced the pun and adopted gorilla masks to preserve their anonymity. These masks soon became a defining element of their identity and work.
The Guerrilla Girls’ work sought to expose the systemic discrimination and lack of recognition faced by women artists and artists of color. The Getty draws on its extensive archives of the materials they used to spread their message nationwide. These works remain strikingly relevant today, as their critiques of bias and their warnings about regressive political forces continue to resonate in the present moment.
One campaign features a billboard of the Mona Lisa with her mouth covered, accompanied by the statement: “First they try to take away a woman’s right to choose. Now they’re censoring art.” The piece was created in response to Reagan-era policies that threatened both artistic expression and women’s reproductive rights.
Many of the Guerrilla Girls’ campaigns directly challenged New York City’s most prestigious museums for their failure to recognize women artists on equal footing with men. Another poster on display at the Getty pointedly asks: “What’s new and happening at the Guggenheim for the discriminating art lover? The same old isms: racism, sexism, ageism, eurocentrism, nepotism, elitism, phallocentrism.”
One of their most iconic works is their 1989 protest targeting the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The group funded a series of striking bus ads featuring the famous female nude from Ingres’ “Grand Odalisque” (1814), her face concealed behind a gorilla mask. Set against a bright banana-yellow background, bold black text reads: “Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum? Less than 5% of the artists in the Modern Art Sections are women but 85% of the nudes are female.” The image became an instant symbol of their movement, and countless updated iterations have appeared over the years as the original imbalance persists.
What makes the Guerrilla Girls especially compelling was their strategic use of mass media to amplify their message and stimulate change during a time before social media or the internet. The Getty’s archives include video and audio from the group’s various performances across New York City, news appearances, clippings from the group’s satirical newspaper “Hot Flashes,” and extensive written correspondence both from and to the collective.
The final section of the exhibition “XOXO, Guerrilla Girls” features various letters fans wrote to the collective, as well as letters the Guerrilla Girls wrote to various museums, curators and collectors, along with merchandise the group created for mass distribution.
The exhibition concludes with a floor-to-ceiling chalkboard wall reading: “Guerrilla Girls invite you to: criticize, apologize, analyze, canonize, antagonize.” Covered in responses from past visitors, such as “there is no limit to what we can accomplish” and “when does the labor end?” The installation echoes the graffiti wall from the Guerrilla Girls’ 1987 Clocktower Exhibition, a protest against the Whitney Museum’s declining representation of women and artists of color.
Leaving the exhibition, viewers are prompted to consider a central question of introspection: How can I be a Guerrilla Girl? The show demonstrates how the group became globally influential through humor, creativity, and unapologetic truth-telling. Today, they remain highly active on social media, particularly Instagram, where they have 163,000 followers and describe themselves as “Artist activists using facts, humor & outrageous images to expose sexism, racism & corruption in art, politics & pop culture.” Though four decades have passed since their founding, many of the issues they confront persist, thus making their work, and the lessons it offers, as urgent as ever.
The exhibition will remain open to the public through April 12, 2026. In January, the Getty will host two special events in conjunction with the show. “Cocktails with a Curator” will take place on January 10, with tickets released on December 19. On January 17, acclaimed writer and social commentator Roxane Gay will lead a conversation with the Guerrilla Girls; tickets for this event are already available on the Getty website.
