Mindy Taylor Ross sits Downtown, in front of a new window installation by Gautam Rao titled "Interrupting Cow." (Michelle Pemberton for The Star)

Two members of New York City's Guerrilla Girls, a group of masked social activists famous for protesting the lack of female artists represented in New York in the 1980s and the ongoing dearth of women directing films, will visit Indianapolis for a performance and lecture Nov. 3.

While some, like the Guerrilla Girls, take outlandish steps to protest gender inequality on the cultural front, others here are making an impact in their own important ways.

Mindy Taylor Ross

Mindy Taylor Ross, director of public art for the Arts Council of Indianapolis, is responsible for bringing in major exhibits like Julian Opie's "Signs" that fill Downtown with outdoor contemporary art.

At 33, she faces both the challenge of being young and being a woman.

"We have some very strong women in leadership positions here," Ross said. "Things are changing. But I do believe they need to change more. I do believe the 'old boys' club still exists."

For Ross, the best way to get past prejudices is to "bring it."

"That's what it's all about. You have to be informed and professional and know what you're talking about," she said. "If you do the hard work, you can make up for what might be perceived as a lack of experience by being prepared. Like anything else, you have to prove yourself."

Ross said it's important to have women -- as well as people of various backgrounds -- assuming leadership roles in the arts here.

"It's about having diverse perspectives from the community represented," she said. "The different cultures in the community should have their voices at the table. We all make contributions to the city on a daily basis and should be part of the top level of cultural decisions, too."

Ross is pleased that she's able to be part of "a convergence of really strong women in the city making a big difference in the visual arts" over the past few years.

"It makes me feel really good," she said. "It's a privilege and joy to make a contribution to my hometown. I want this to be an interesting place to live and work and feel engaged and fulfilled."

Robin Coleman

Music promoter Robin Coleman of Segment of Society Promotions works in a "pretty male-dominated" music scene here.

She got into the business of booking music acts by accident after her favorite venue, the Cath Coffee House on 54th Street, closed in 2004.

Instead of sulking, Coleman -- who isn't a performer -- started finding other places for the live acoustic acts she enjoyed watching.

"I just stepped up to the plate and did something I have a passion for," she said. "It's a lot of work but not a lot of work."

Last year, Coleman booked about 70 shows and attended almost all of them. She currently puts on shows at a handful of venues -- like the Lazy Daze coffee shop in Irvington -- six or seven times a month.

While she still sees women singer-songwriters struggling to make it big in the industry, she hasn't felt any resistance as a woman bringing music to this city. "Everybody is great to work with here," she said.

But, if she ever moves on from this role, Coleman isn't sure there'd be another woman ready to fill her shoes.

"I'd like to find more people interested in doing this," she said. "It's hard and frustrating, but it's something so many people love."

Pam Powell

During her six years as director of the Indianapolis LGBT Film Festival, Pam Powell has become more confident as a female leader.

"There were times in the past when I felt my gender may have kept me from being taken as seriously when meeting with a male member of the community or the media," she said, noting that she would sometimes ask a male board member to step in on these occasions. "But I've felt a shift here in the past few years."

Now Powell said she no longer has those concerns or "anything to complain about" when it comes to working as a female cultural leader here.

But she'd like to see more women get involved, both as leaders and active participants at events like the LGBT Film Festival (Nov. 9-11), which still draws a predominantly white male audience.

"If you want to be involved, I haven't found many forces holding you back as a woman in this community," Powell said.

And the same is true, she's found, for people of different sexual orientations. "In the Indianapolis metropolitan area, it's not really an issue. It's more so in rural parts of the state," she said. "The gay community around Indianapolis is really thriving on any front people are interested in."

And she's found the arts community very welcoming. "The (LGBT Film) festival had booths at both Penrod and the Broad Ripple Art Fair, and we were blown away by the positive response we received," she said. "The community at large really supports what we do. Last year, by our best calculations, 30 to 40 percent of the people at our festival were heterosexual."

Powell said the movie kicking off this year's 29-film festival -- "The Itty Bitty Titty Committee" -- is about a radical feminist group with links to the Guerrilla Girls.

Karen Kovacik

For local poet and professor Karen Kovacik, overt gender-based exclusion may be less of an issue here, but she'd like to see more local cultural organizations take a proactive approach to empowering creative women.

Kovacik said that -- while informal things are happening all around Indianapolis -- other cities, larger and smaller than ours, offer publishing or artistic collectives for women, as well as grant and funding opportunities targeted for women.

"On one hand, it might seem we're beyond these kinds of concerns," she said. "But I don't think we are."

Kovacik, associate professor of English and director of creative writing at IUPUI, works to help do something culturally for women here herself, by organizing the local celebration of International Women's Day in early March or late February. She's done it each of the last 10 years.

The event works to bring women of different ages and cultural backgrounds together to share their words. "A lot of young women come up to me every year and tell me how powerful this event has been for them," Kovacik said. "It's really powerful when a bunch of women from different backgrounds can come to voice together like that."

Through events like these, much can be learned for everybody involved -- women and men alike. "As a teacher, it's a responsibility for me to be mindful of the multiplicity of people and explore what divides us and what unites us," she said.

And that's also the job of poets and painters and other creative people. "If they can help us be conscious of the identities that shape our lives, that's an important first step," Kovacik said.

Deborah Asante

For Deborah Asante, founder and artistic director of the Asante Children's Theatre of Indianapolis, breaking down barriers has always been a big part of her struggle.

But race and gender aren't the toughest; it's age.

People don't take the children and teens she works with seriously. "It's hard to get people to respond. Even in the arts community, brilliant artists look at the children and say, 'That's cute and sweet.' They don't understand how powerful the art can be from children or teens," Asante said.

But challenges like this -- as well as what she sees as additional difficulties for nonwhite males -- only push her forward. "In the trenches where I live, you roll up your sleeves and keep going," she said. "I haven't had time to sit back and lament about that."

Race and gender issues have just always been there, she said. "I grew up with it. It's part of my life. The sun shines. It's useless to sit on your butt and say, 'Woe is me.' You have to keep moving on it."

While the struggle continues, Asante said positive forces of change are winning in Indianapolis.

"There's still an old guard. They believe what they believe," she said. "It's unconscious, but it's the choice they make."

But cultural experiences like live theater can help change these perspectives for people on both sides of race and gender issues.

"I might be watching and say, 'Here comes the white girl. What does she have to say?' And when she speaks to me -- spirit to spirit -- I can learn something."

Asante calls that kind of communication the wave of the future. Instead of worrying about gender or race, it's about "getting rid of all of the clutter" and connecting with other people who are the same on the inside, in their spirits.

"You can't just look at the person and, by looking, understand. You have to reach out and touch. And that's kind of scary," she said.

"It's like if everybody wore veils and you were trying to find your family. You wouldn't just turn away. You'd search and look into people's eyes. You can't just look at the color of the veil."

Art can help to break down barriers

While the Guerrilla Girls are happy to have helped the art world make strides toward their goal of equality for people of all races and genders, the group still sees the world as having a long way to go.

"One hundred and fifty years of feminism is not enough to change the effects of thousands of years of misogyny and patriarchy," said Frida Kahlo. (All the Guerrilla Girls use the names of dead female artists.) "It's a gradual process."

Likewise, several women helping shape the cultural scene in Indianapolis are upbeat about our direction here. But they still see room for improvement.

"We're 60 percent of the way there," said Joyce Sommers, president and executive director of the Indianapolis Art Center for 31 years. "But there will always be that other 40 percent. There's no such thing in life or culture when we can say, 'We're done. We can stop working on it now.'." While Sommers said she has "a little bit of the Guerrilla Girls in her," she takes the approach of using art to break down walls and bring communities together.

"Art is one thing that can help us reach across many borders of diversity and help us communicate with each other," she said.

And she sees those borders vanishing all the time. "We've really been growing out of our provincialism here over time," Sommers said. "We've made great leaps over the last seven to 10 years."

Guerrilla Girls What: Two of the Guerrilla Girls will appear as keynote speakers at the 2007 Art Education Association of Indiana (AEAI) annual conference. When: 10 a.m. Nov. 3. Where: University Place Conference Center Auditorium, 850 W. Michigan St. Tickets: Free, but this ticketed event requires preregistration, and seating is limited. Call Sue Jackson at (317) 278-9469 to register. Info: www.herron.iupui.edu, www.guerrillagirls.com.

Indianapolis LGBT Film Festival What: A festival of 29 films connected to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered communities. The event benefits the Indiana Youth Group. When: Various times, Nov. 9-11. Where: Landmark's Keystone Art Cinema, 8702 Keystone Crossing. Tickets: $8-$15. Info: www.indylgbtfilmfest.com.