PARIS.- Since its creation in 2014, the association AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions has been working to highlight the work of women artists from the 19th and 20th centuries. In the autumn of 2021, AWARE moved to the Villa Vassilieff, where in the 1910s the Russian artist Marie Vassilieff set up her studio and opened an academy which quickly became a centre of cultural and artistic life in Montparnasse. AWARE is continuing Marie Vassilieff’s legacy by welcoming as many people as possible into her former academy. Moving into this historic space in 2021 is a strong symbol of the association’s mission: giving visibility to women artists. This new space will enable the growing association to better respond to the numerous requests it receives for workshops, courses, and research, as well as to further develop the activities for which it is renowned. The Villa Vassilieff, reimagined by matali crasset, will once more open its doors to the public in January 2022.

Public reception on the ground floor

The ground floor includes an information and reception point - featuring AWARE’s numerous publications - a space for public mediation and school workshops, a projection room, and an interactive audio studio. For the mediation area, matali crasset, who also designed the exhibition Be AWARE: A History of Women Artists, has designed light and colourful furniture. This space and its contents are adaptable, allowing AWARE to host school groups for green workshops centred on women artists. In the current educational landscape where activities and art publications for the young are dominated by male artists, this unique project aims to provide young people with role models outside of any gender stereotypes. AWARE hopes that through introducing children to these artists from a young age, it can contribute to their art historical knowledge and invite the greatest number of people to experience the emotion that art can provide.

Documentation and research centre on the first floor

On the first floor, AWARE’s documentation and research centre extends over 150 metres. Currently comprised of nearly 3000 references - monographs, exhibition catalogues, essays, magazines - relating to women artists and feminist art, this area is also dedicated to hosting meetings, conferences, and art history courses for all audiences, such as the itinerant documentary exhibition Be AWARE: A History of Women Artists, dedicated to the recognition of women artists of the 20th century. The documentation centre has been named in tribute to Delphine Lévy (1969-2020), who founded and directed the public institution Paris Musées, which groups together the fourteen museums of the City of Paris. From 2013 to 2020, she led an active policy of renovating the museums and worked to ensure that as many people as possible had access to their collections, making them free of charge and digitising them. Sensitive to the struggles of AWARE, she worked to strengthen the place of women in the management of the museums of the City of Paris and devoted a significant number of exhibitions to women artists. Delphine Levy, an art historian, was the French specialist on the English painter Walter Sickert. The Villa Vassilieff also includes an adjoining studio that can accommodate academics and curators in residence. The Villa Vassilieff was renovated with the support of the City of Paris, the Élysées Monceau’s endowment fund and David Azéma.