I feel like I have at least begun to make a contribution, but my most significant concern has to do with whether my actual art will be preserved for future generations or be erased.

Donald, my husband, considers himself a feminist.

It's not enough to have a few women's studies courses. Why is it more important to study Paul Revere's midnight ride than it is Susan B. Anthony's 50-year effort to transform the face of America for women? When you're in school, most of the events you study are about men. Men's activities lauded and repeated over and over. What about us? What about commemorating the decades-long struggle for suffrage? Why don't we hear those stories over and over and over again. It's almost inconceivable for men to understand what it would be like to live without that constant valorization.

There's no question that many more women artists are showing worldwide now than they were when I was a young woman, and that's really great.

Ah, well, do I wish that we lived in a world where gender didn't figure so prominently? Of course. Do I even think about myself as a woman when I go to make art? Of course not.

I set my sights upon becoming the kind of artist who would make a contribution to art history

Don't give up. It's really important to trust your impulses as an artist no matter what anybody else says.