At long last, the female artist is present

Marina Abramović is the first woman to have a solo show in the Royal Academy's main galleries. Why did it take so long?

- Hannah Jane Parkinson

At London's Royal Academy, until New Year's Day, the artist Marina Abramović will be present. Or rather, her work is, as part of a retrospective taking in her half-century career. Abramović is a worthy subject for a major solo show at such a prestigious institution. Through the likes of Rhythm 0 (1974), during which she laid out 72 objects (including a gun and a bullet) and put herself at the mercy of her audience, to the moving and intimate The Artist Is Present (2010) at New York's Museum of Modern Art, she has redefined performance art. But here is the ludicrous and infuriating thing: hers will be the first solo show by a woman at the academy's main galleries.