The City of Melbourne has committed to build three statues of prominent women in a bid to address the massive gender imbalance in public art.
Currently, just 9 of 580 statues in Melbourne depict real women, an issue that’s seen lobby group A Monument of One’s Own (AMOO) — co-convened by Clare Wright and Kristine Ziwica — placing pressure on governments to address the imbalance.
Independent MP for Goldstein Zoe Daniel said she would strongly put the case forward for Vida Goldstein, who was a leading suffragist and the first Australian woman to nominate for election in the federal parliament. Goldstein ran for election several times as an independent, and was also the first Australian to meet an American President at the Oval Office, when she was Australia and New Zealand’s sole delegate to the International Women’s Suffrage Conference.
Source: Melbourne to get three new statues of prominent women