“Having this really flexible digital virtual presence where I’m not restricted at all because of physicality, I feel I can be really open to artists from all over,” she said. Arbus has attracted digital artists from around the world. Twelve of her fifteen artists are women. “In the digital art sphere that I hang out in, most people are vehemently fighting for equal access and raising up voices that have been put down, I think there’s really a strong generation of artists who want to make space and want to lift each other up.”

Arbus says her values of social justice and feminism are inextricably connected. For instance, twenty per cent of all SFF’s sales support Black Women in Motion and Black Artists’ Network in Dialogue (BAND) Gallery & Cultural Centre. Her values are also reflected in the focus of her artists’ work. Amanda Amour Lynx for instance, is a queer, Two Spirit, mixed Mi’kmaw interdisciplinary artist who combines traditional approaches with new media and digital art to explore important issues such as the environment, land and relationality and gender identity. It is also important for Arbus that her artists are supported and fairly compensated. Unlike traditional galleries where there is typically a 50/50 split, Arbus has more flexible arrangements on a project-by-project basis.

While Studio Sixty-Six’s Carrie Colton, 59, has a more traditional brick-and-mortar set-up, she also represents the new ethos of gallerists. When she opened her gallery in 2013 she seized the opportunity to do things differently. “I wanted cultural diversity right from the beginning,” she said. Colton represents twenty-one artists, half are women and several are people of colour. “I’m not a gallery that is trying to represent as many artists as possible so I can cover as wide a market and make as much money as possible,” she said. “I’m really trying to work with a small number of artists so I can really help those artists with their careers.” And Colton has seen a shift in collectors looking for help to diversify their collections. “The conversations are starting to happen and it’s really wonderful,” she said.

The bright spot in this bleak canvas is how women are holding each other up. They are helping each other gain confidence, sustain their practice and secure opportunities. Community is often the backbone of women’s success in any endeavour.

For many artists having access to free platforms like Instagram, Facebook and Tik Tok is a way to develop and engage a community. For Rockliff, it was the outpouring of support of her online community that encouraged her pursue art as a vocation, not just a hobby. “My origin story is I started posting my art online to get my feelings out,” she said. She sparked lots of dialogue with others about art, consent, being a survivor.

Communities of women are working to ensure women get their fair cut of the NFT pie. The world of NFTs is dizzying. And intimidating. But running towards the possibilities of NFTs rather than running away can have a serious upside. Women of Crypto Art offers courses like ‘Setting up a Mobile Tezos Wallet’—perhaps in response to the fact that only 15 percent of cryptocurrency users are women, which obviously poses a barrier to enter the NFT world—and ‘Minting your Artwork on Hicetnunc’. All-women NFT shows like Grafitti Queens organized by Crypto Luna and one on International Women’s Day are gaining attention. Michele Pred, one of the International Women’s Day exhibit organizers, told artnet: “We want to see more diversity in the work being shared in digital marketplaces, and we want to see BIPOC women especially benefitting from this boom.”

Toronto artist Jenn Long, 47, a former assistant professor & associate chair of cross-disciplinary art practice at the Ontario College of Art and Design (OCAD) co-founded the Feminist Photography Network (FPN) to promote and sustain women’s art. Long said it is as much of an accomplishment for a woman artist to still be doing art mid-career as it is to be making money from it. “Probably more of an accomplishment,” Long said.