Alum Diane Jacobs' Provocative Exhibit Confronts Gender Inequality

STATESMEN JOURNAL (SALEM, OREGON) -- A few years later while Jacobs was getting her masters in printmaking at San Francisco State, another event had a lasting impact on her art. After seeing the Guerrilla Girls, Jacobs was riding home on the Bay Area Rapid Transit alone when a man asked for a couple quarters. She obliged. He said, “Thanks, honey.” She said, “Don’t call me, 'Honey.’” “He just flew off the handle and called me every name in the book and was just screaming at me,” Jacobs said. The incident propelled her to purchase a number of slang dictionaries. She began researching the plethora of derogatory and profane terms used to belittle women and turn them into sexual objects. She channeled the frightening experience into her printmaking, type setting and book art. “Hand setting these words, words that really disturbed me, they really kind of lost their power,” Jacobs said. She began printing the profanity on strips of paper that she wove into beautiful objects.