ARTIST STATEMENT
Having the experience of growing up on a farm in rural Nebraska — one of my jobs was to “clear off” my Dad’s “pig parlor” each day after school. So, I can tell you a lot about swine. Fast forward to: Fact check: As early as 2015, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump denied that he had ever called female adversaries some of the words Fox News host Megyn Kelly listed at the first GOP debate — “fat pigs, dogs, slobs and disgusting animals.” In fact, he used all of those disparaging terms. Some things never change.
Then again on November 14, 2025, President Trump told Bloomberg White House correspondent Catherine Lucey, “Quiet, quiet piggy” during a widely reported incident aboard Air Force One. White House press secretary Karoline Levitt defended the “quiet piggy” comment — describing that the president “is very frank and honest with everyone in this room.” Needless to say, multitudes of the Nation’s womyn were offended by such demeaning language coming out of the mouth of the 47th President of the United States.
Trump’s crude remarks did not stop there. He continued to demean several female reporters who had asked him questions that he didn’t like, by calling them “ugly, stupid and piggy.” The famous pig quote from George Orwell’s Animal Farm (1945) is: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”. This phrase, spoken by the pigs to justify their corruption, highlights the hypocrisy of the authoritarian regime established on the farm.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Rhonda Urdang (nee Thomas born 1953 Wahoo, NE) is an interdisciplinary artist who has been inspired by the intersectional feminist and peace movements. She has had a varied and interesting career since the early 1970s. Rhonda has worked as a typesetter, museum gallery attendant, apprentice dot etcher and journeyman color separation artist on high-fashion catalogs in the graphic arts industry in Omaha and Phoenix. Since leaving academia, the patriarchy and pseudoscience behind, her ingenuity has flourished. Her visionary art responds to historical and world events, when painting and the female artist are still being diminished, silenced, marginalized, and erased.
Rhonda is interested in making art that challenges the narrative. The feminist art movement has argued that re-appropriation and re-signification is a cross-cultural process by which disregarded or oppressed individuals can reclaim artifacts that were previously used in a disparaging manner and uplift them in a way that brings about socio-political empowerment for under-represented womyn. She stays true to her instincts and is always authentic. Her thought-provoking works have been shown in local, regional, national and international shows in 42 states. She has lived and worked in Northern Arizona spanning four decades where stargazing has become a crucial aspect of her world on the Colorado Plateau. Rhonda continues to push boundaries with her artwork, inspiring meaningful dialogue and social change. For more than one decade, Flagstaff Feminist Art Studio has championed the work of countless artists, regardless of gender, while providing a platform for creative expression, social discourse, and femme empowerment.
© Rhonda Urdang