Category: Women Artists

Portrait Artist and American Impressionist Lilla Cabot Perry is best-known as an American Impressionist painter, creating landscapes and portraits in a free form manner. Impressionism is characterized by loose brushwork and vivid colors. She was greatly influenced by Ralph Waldo Emerson‘s philosophies, and her friendships with Claude Monet and Camille Pissarro greatly influenced her work. Pissarro acted as a father figure to all four major Post-Impressionists: Vincent van Gogh, Georges Seurat, Paul Gaugin, and Paul Cezanne. Image: Self Portrait (1890s) By Lilla Cabot Perry Early Years Lydia (Lilla) Cabot was born January 13, 1848 in Boston, Massachusetts, the eldest of eight children of Hannah Lowell Jackson Cabot and distinguished surgeon Dr. Samuel Cabot III. The Cabots prominent in Boston society,…

Painter of Politicians and Officials in Washington DC Cornelia Adele Fassett was an American artist known for her political paintings and portraits. Her most famous work, The Florida Case Before the Electoral Commission (1878), now hangs in the United States Capitol. Her paintings of the Supreme Court and Justices are in the art collection of the U.S. Supreme Court. Image: Cornelia Adele Strong Fassett Between 1865 and 1880 Library of Congress Personal Life Cornelia Adele Strong was born November 9, 1831 in Owasco, New York, the third of six children of Captain Walker Strong and Sarah Devoe Strong. Cornelia was raised in Jefferson, Ohio, where her father was a hotel keeper. On August 26, 1851 Cornelia married Samuel Montague Fassett,…

First Woman to Work as a Professional Artist Fanny Palmer (1812-1876) was the first woman in the United States to work as a professional artist, and to make a living with her art. She produced more Currier and Ives’ prints than any other artist, and she was the only female in a business that was dominated by men. Painting was not considered a suitable occupation for a woman. Image: A small, frail woman, Fanny Palmer stood bent over her work for so many years in the same position that she developed a widow’s hump in her later years. Early Life Frances (Fanny) Flora Bond, the daughter of an attorney, was born in 1812 in Leicester, England, and she received an…

Portrait and Genre Artist of the Mid-19th Century Probably the most famous woman painter of her time, Lilly Martin Spencer was known for her sentimental scenes of family life. While living in New York City with her husband and children, she attended night classes at the National Academy of Design and supported her family through the sale of her art. Today she is acknowledged as one of America’s premier genre painters. Image: Self-portrait of the artist Angelique Marie Martin, nicknamed Lilly, was born on November 26, 1822 in Exeter, England, the only daughter of Gilles Marie Martin and Angelique Perrine LePetit Martin. Her parents had grown up in late eighteenth century France when women were first admitted to the French…

Washington DC Socialite and Photographer Clover Adams was a socialite, an active hostess in Washington, DC society, an accomplished amateur photographer, and one of the earliest portrait photographers in the United States. Her work was widely admired, but her husband, historian Henry Adams, would not allow her to become a professional and discouraged any publication of her work. Image: Clover Adams on horseback at Beverly Farms, October 1869 The photo shown here is the only known adult photograph of Clover; no close–up picture of her face exists. After her death, Henry Adams destroyed all of her photos in their home, and neither her father nor her family had ever received a picture of Clover’s face. (Marian) Clover Hooper was born…