After presenting an exhibition of artists from the 1913 Armory Show last fall, Lincoln Glenn and Graham Shay 1857 will return this spring with a collaborative exhibition to recognize the contributions of some of the thousands of women artists who were members of the National Association of Women Artists (NAWA). Founded in 1889, the organization is the oldest collective of women artists in the United States and provides a community for professional women artists and promotes the work of its members through annual exhibitions, touring shows, awards, and educational and outreach programs. Throughout its distinguished history, NAWA members have included Bessie Potter Vonnoh, Harriet Whitney Frishmuth, Jane Peterson, Ida O’Keeffe, Isabel Bishop, Doris Lee, Dorothy Dehner, Louise Nevelson, Agnes Pelton, Anna Walinska and Cecilia Beaux. its levels, all of which are represented in the exhibition.
Just as Virginia Woolf believed that women authors needed a modest salary and a room of their own to write fiction, women artists have sought a place to display their work and a group of peers to provide artistic and intellectual support. The National Association of Women Artists, originally called the Woman’s Art Club of New York, was founded by five women who felt isolated from the community of their peers and the opportunity to exhibit their art. They gave women an alternative to the National Academy of Design and Society of American Artists in New York, which continued to prevent women from participating in many life drawing and anatomy classes, obtaining government positions, and exhibiting their art at annual exhibitions. .