CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- You'd think there'd be a limit to how much you could accomplish by concealing your identities behind the names of famous female artists and dressing like gorillas.

But the Guerrilla Girls are about to mark 25 years of calling out the "stale, male and pale" art establishment, as well as a few other pale-male dominated places, like Hollywood.

The in-your-face work of these anonymous female artist-activists has since become a part of women's and gender study courses worldwide. Museums they've ridiculed for discrimination against female artists and artists of color now include "Guerrilla Girls" posters in their collections -- along with displaying more work by women and artists of color.

Their art history book, "The Guerrilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art," is used as a textbook in many colleges. They're cited in hundreds of art and feminist anthologies and even included in "Gardner's Art Through the Ages," a standard art history text.

But their work is most definitely not done here, says "Frida Kahlo," a founding member. She was in Institute to take part in the recent opening of a Guerrilla Girls exhibit, on display through Nov. 19 at the Della Brown Taylor Gallery in the Davis Fine Arts Building of West Virginia State University.

"Things change. Sometimes they get better. Sometimes it's two steps forward, three steps backward," said Kahlo, whose pseudonym honors the fiercely outspoken Mexican female artist.

With posters, buttons, billboards, artwork and other public "actions," the Guerrilla Girls have plastered walls and cities across the world with a consistent message: that museums that are supposed to be portraying the story of a culture or a nation are often missing key parts of the tale.

One of the Guerrilla Girls' artistic ambushes took on the museums on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

"These are the national museums that are supposed to tell our history," Kahlo said. "When we did a survey, the museums were like 92 percent male and 98 percent white" in the works on display.

Things are a little better in the art world nowadays, she said. "It's a no-brainer now -- that you can't tell the story of culture without all the voices in it. But there's a glass ceiling that hits women artists very quickly. They are included in survey exhibitions that are supposed to be about a general topic. Galleries know it doesn't look good to not have women of color in their galleries.

"But scratch deeper -- women don't get solo exhibitions at major museums; they don't get monographs written about them. Look at auction results. White male artists are the ones that get the huge sums of money. Women and artists of color get 5 to 10 cents on the dollar to what white males get."

Art critic Hilton Kramer once described the Guerrilla Girls as "quota queens" of the art world, a broadside Kahlo is happy to counter with a response and a tart diss.

"Hilton, we never called for a specific percentage  of women artists - we just said you can't tell the story of our culture without everyone in it," Kahlo said.

"He's just using the language of the far right - that when you're accused of something you throw it back at your accusers. We just made fun  of ridiculously low percentages. Hilton Kramer is so yesterday in terms of art criticism, in general."

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- You'd think there'd be a limit to how much you could accomplish by concealing your identities behind the names of famous female artists and dressing like gorillas.

But the Guerrilla Girls are about to mark 25 years of calling out the "stale, male and pale" art establishment, as well as a few other pale-male dominated places, like Hollywood.

The in-your-face work of these anonymous female artist-activists has since become a part of women's and gender study courses worldwide. Museums they've ridiculed for discrimination against female artists and artists of color now include "Guerrilla Girls" posters in their collections -- along with displaying more work by women and artists of color.

Their art history book, "The Guerrilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art," is used as a textbook in many colleges. They're cited in hundreds of art and feminist anthologies and even included in "Gardner's Art Through the Ages," a standard art history text.

But their work is most definitely not done here, says "Frida Kahlo," a founding member. She was in Institute to take part in the recent opening of a Guerrilla Girls exhibit, on display through Nov. 19 at the Della Brown Taylor Gallery in the Davis Fine Arts Building of West Virginia State University.

"Things change. Sometimes they get better. Sometimes it's two steps forward, three steps backward," said Kahlo, whose pseudonym honors the fiercely outspoken Mexican female artist.

With posters, buttons, billboards, artwork and other public "actions," the Guerrilla Girls have plastered walls and cities across the world with a consistent message: that museums that are supposed to be portraying the story of a culture or a nation are often missing key parts of the tale.

One of the Guerrilla Girls' artistic ambushes took on the museums on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

"These are the national museums that are supposed to tell our history," Kahlo said. "When we did a survey, the museums were like 92 percent male and 98 percent white" in the works on display.

Things are a little better in the art world nowadays, she said. "It's a no-brainer now -- that you can't tell the story of culture without all the voices in it. But there's a glass ceiling that hits women artists very quickly. They are included in survey exhibitions that are supposed to be about a general topic. Galleries know it doesn't look good to not have women of color in their galleries.

"But scratch deeper -- women don't get solo exhibitions at major museums; they don't get monographs written about them. Look at auction results. White male artists are the ones that get the huge sums of money. Women and artists of color get 5 to 10 cents on the dollar to what white males get."

Art critic Hilton Kramer once described the Guerrilla Girls as "quota queens" of the art world, a broadside Kahlo is happy to counter with a response and a tart diss.

"Hilton, we never called for a specific percentage  of women artists - we just said you can't tell the story of our culture without everyone in it," Kahlo said.

"He's just using the language of the far right - that when you're accused of something you throw it back at your accusers. We just made fun  of ridiculously low percentages. Hilton Kramer is so yesterday in terms of art criticism, in general."

Their work to spotlight sexism and racism has taken them beyond art to the often cloistered worlds of film, politics and pop culture.

The posed the question "What kind of film would Hollywood produce to portray the rise of feminism?" And answered it with a movie poster that depicts three women in bikinis, the stars of "The Birth of Feminism": Pamela Anderson as Gloria Steinem, Halle Berry as Flo Kennedy and Catherine Zeta-Jones as Bella Abzug. The poster's tag line: "They made women's rights look good. Really good."

(When Steinem first glanced at the poster, she was peeved, thinking it was real.)

In 2002, the Guerrilla Girls hooked up with a bunch of female filmmakers to place a billboard a few blocks from the Academy Awards ceremony. The billboard portrayed "The Anatomically Correct Oscar," ditching a golden Oscar in favor of a pale, white one. "He's white and male, just like the guys who win," the billboard read, noting the low percentage of acting, directing and writing Oscars that go to women and minorities.

As the Guerrillagirls.com Web site dryly notes in what could be regarded as a mission statement:

"We've discovered that ridicule and humiliation, backed up by irrefutable information, can disarm the powers that be, put them on the spot, and force them to examine themselves. A few years ago, some new members joined who were impressed by our reputation but disagreed with our sense of humor. They wanted us to start organizing seminars and writing position papers. They lived out the stereotype of feminists with no sense of humor. We had to kiss them goodbye."

What's next up in the steely-eyed glare of these guerrillas? Kahlo responds with a characteristic Guerrilla Girls crack.

"We're sort of hormonal," she says. "We sort of do projects and that make us angry at that moment."

"What really pisses us off right now is that young women now have so many opportunities women did not have 35 or 40 years ago, but they are, in a way, paralyzed by body image, by how the media makes them feel like they must look," Kahlo said.

"If we could really set a campaign to confront and combat that -- in advertising, in music and television. Everywhere young women go they are confronted by these unnatural and overly idealized standards. We would really like to figure out a way to make that go away."

Want to go?

Guerrilla Girls exhibit

WHERE: Della Brown Taylor Gallery, Davis Fine Arts Building, West Virginia State University, Institute

WHEN: Up through Nov. 19, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays

CONTACT: Call 304-766-3196.

Reach Douglas Imbrogno at doug...@cnpapers.com or 304-348-3017.