Chicago artist and teacher Ethel Coe (1878-1938) spent several summers painting in Taos, New Mexico beginning in 1915.
Symposium
MIDWEST WOMEN ARTISTS 1840-1940
DISCOVERING THEIR WORK, TELLING THEIR STORIES, LEARNING FROM THE PAST
NOVEMBER 7 & 8, 2013
BRADLEY UNIVERSITY
PEORIA, ILLINOIS
Join us for this interdisciplinary conference to explore the art, experiences and legacies of women artists working in the Midwest between 1840 and 1940.
The Midwestern United States consists of the following states: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.
The symposium is organized by the Bradley University Art History Program and the Illinois Women Artists Project with support from the Women’s Studies Department, the Inland Visual Studies Center, and the Peoria Riverfront Museum.
Symposium expenses are being covered by our sponsors and donors. Lunch, travel and overnight expenses will be the responsibility of the symposium participant.
ADMISSION IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.
Symposium Highlights
The symposium opens the afternoon of Thursday November 7 with tours of the Citywide Celebration of Women Artists exhibitions. At 5:00pm Wanda Corn, PhD, will give the Keynote Address at the Caterpillar Global Communications Center on the Bradley campus. A reception and tour of the exhibition Paintings by Eleanor Coen and her husband Max Kahn at the Heuser Art Center follows at 6:00pm. An exhibit of women artists' works from the University Collection will be on display at Hartmann Gallery. On Friday November 8, panel discussions and presentations will be held on the Bradley campus.
Keynote Speaker
Wanda Corn is a nationally recognized historian of American art and Professor Emeritus, Stanford University, where she served as Chair of the Department of Art and Art History. Dr. Corn is the author of The Great American Thing, Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Seeing Gertrude Stein: five stories, and most recently Women Building History: Public Art at the 1893 Columbian Exposition, which will be the subject of her talk.
Panel: Telling Women Artists' Stories
A discussion of researching, writing and displaying the artwork, artifacts, and experiences of women's history will be led by Joni Kinsey, PhD, Professor of Art History at the University of Iowa, curator of the Eve Drewelowe Collection, author of several books including Plain Pictures: Images of the American Prairie and Thomas Moran's West: Chromolithography, High Art, and Popular Taste.
The panelists are:
Joanna Gardner-Huggett , PhD, Associate Professor of Art History at DePaul University, and author, specializing in research on the intersection between feminist art and activism.
Julie L'Enfant, PhD, Chair of the Liberal Arts Department, Professor of Art History at the University of Minnesota, and author of Pioneer Modernists: Minnesota's first generation of women artists.
Jim Zimmer, Director of Art and History at Illinois State Museum, Springfield, Illinois, curator of The Urge to Embellish among other exhibitions.
Panel: Art Practice, Lessons and Legacies
Connecting early women artists and art mediums with today's artists, the panel will discuss lessons learned, forgotten and reinvigorated over the past century. The panel leader is Joyce Owens , artist, Professor and Curator of the Galleries Program at Chicago State University.
The panelists are:
Carol Dearborn, painter and art workshop leader with a special interest in creativity and Shamanism. She is the third generation of women painters in her family.
Joan Ericksen, artist and Co-Founder and Development Director, Sun Foundation in Washburn, IL.
Lynn Hellmuth, sculptor, exhibition designer and curator in Madison, Wisconsin.
Beate Minkovski, Co-founder and Executive Director of the Woman Made Gallery in Chicago.
Presentations
The afternoon session will be moderated by Kristan McKinsey, Director of Collections/Senior Curator for the Peoria Riverfront Museum.Past symposiums: 2011 at Bradley University and 2009 at Illinois State University, Bloomington.