Lee Lozano Prints

Lee Lozano (November 5, 1930 – October 2, 1999) was an American painter, and visual and conceptual artist. She earned her BFA from The Art Institute of Chicago and after traveling in Europe for a year, Lozano moved to New York City to pursue her career as an artist. Like many of her contemporaries, including Adrian Piper and Vito Acconci, Lozano began to pursue Conceptual projects starting in the mid-1960s. In February 1969 she commenced her General Strike Piece, in which she withdrew from the New York art world. In August 1971, she began another notorious work of refusal, Decide to Boycott Women. What began as a one-month experiment intended to improve communication with women wound up as a twenty-seven year hiatus from speaking or otherwise relating to them. Her systematic rejection of all members of her own gender lasted for the remainder of her life. Lozano effectively cut off ties with friends, fellow artists, gallerists, and other women who had been long-time supporters of her art. In a 2001 interview, Lucy Lippard noted, "Lee was extraordinarily intense, one of the first, if not the first person (along with Ian Wilson) who did the life-as-art thing. The kind of things other people did as art, she really did as life--and it took us a while to figure that out."