Brown never felt her work to be less important than that of male artists in the Bay Area. Throughout her life, she maintained that many of the men helped, not hurt, her career in the late 1950s and early 1960s: "I knew I was in a minority, but I never thought twice about that. There was never any patronizing or condescending attitudes. I was supported like hell. But not in a patronizing way."4 As a student at the California School of Fine Arts (CSFA), she found this support in teachers such as Frank Lobdell and her lifelong mentor, Elmer Bischoff. Bischoff encouraged Brown's exuberant use of paint, but, more importantly, he pushed her to see the beauty in everyday objects and to pursue her own personal style and artistic vision.5 Brown did acknowledge, however, the discrimination she felt as a young teacher (one of the few females) at the CSFA, where she was offered less pay than her male colleagues and night instead of day classes.
The anti-establishment attitude that characterized the Beat scene, which flourished during Brown's early years in San Francisco, also contributed to her acceptance as an artist. Buoyed by their underground association, the artists encouraged each other to ignore traditional modes of art-making and success as defined by the art market and galleries. Brown's "funky" sculptures using nontraditional materials such as scraps of fur or fabric, cardboard, and wood emphasize a spontaneous, even casual, approach to sculpture. Social roles were upended and women artists such as Bernice Bing, Jay DeFeo, Sonia Gechtoff, and Deborah Remington made an impact on the local and national art scenes. Like Brown, they maintained that they had the respect of their male contemporaries. In 1989, DeFeo, a close friend of Brown, speculated that the Bay Area's noncompetitive, anticommercial spirit helped to further their acceptance:
I really felt that I had the respect of all my male friends who were artists. It wasn't an issue maybe because there wasn't any competition for wall space, even any competition for jobs at the time…. Joan Brown, who was actually more mature than I – we kind of grew up together – I think Joan would answer the question that same way I do.6
