A (very) Short History of American Women Artists with Art Historian Nancy Heller

A lecture for the Corcoran Women’s Committee at the Chevy Chase Club

Tuesday, January 14th, 2020

by Nancy G. Heller, Ph.D.

For more about Dr. Heller click here

To complement this season’s series of talks on the history of American Art, this lecture will focus on women artists working in the U.S. from the 18th century through c.2000. These painters, sculptors, and architects overcame innumerable obstacles to produce major monuments, from the Angel of the Waters fountain in New York’s Central Park to William Randolph Heart’s extravagant Castle in San Simeon, California, and the Viet Nam Veterans Memorial on the National Mall. Artists to be discussed will include long-neglected figures such as the successful 18th-century portraitist Henrietta Johnston and Edmonia Lewis, a popular Neoclassical sculptor based in Rome who was raised on a Chippewa Indian reservation. Reference will also be made to better-known individuals including the Impressionist painter Mary Cassatt, Southwestern icon Georgia O’Keeffe, feminist Judy Chicago, and the always-controversial Kara Walker.

Dr. Heller is a second-generation scholar on this subject; her classic text, Women Artists: An Illustrated History is currently in its 4th revised-and-expanded edition. She is a Professor at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA and continues to write both scholarly and popular articles on the visual and performing arts.