At 93, Joan Semmel Continues to Assert the Female Gaze

In 1973, when no gallery in New York would show her vivid paintings of bodies in various configurations of sex, Joan Semmel created her own space. She poured her savings into renting a unit on 141 Prince Street, called it a gallery and mounted her first solo show in the city. “I believed in the work, and I wanted it to be seen,” she said in a recent conversation at the Jewish Museum. Her new exhibition, “Joan Semmel: In the Flesh” (on through May 31 and one of our picks for must-see exhibitions)...