Women of Art History: Edmonia

Edmonia Lewis. 1844-1907. America.
Sculptor.

How many artists can you name? Chances are, you'll have named many more men than women. From the moment we are children, most of the artists and artworks we are exposed to are created by or about men. It's time to rebalance the scales and open up the artistic 'canon', introducing more women and ethnic minorities into the widely known narrative of art history. Here, I'll be trying to do just that in the style of a children's story, introducing you to one more woman from art and art history who, until now, you might not have known. 

Once upon a time, a little girl called Edmonia was orphaned and was raised by her aunts and her older brother. She helped her aunts sell Native American baskets to tourists. In 1859, her brother helped give her enough money for her to go to college and study art. 

Edmonia was Native American and African American. At Oberlin College there were only a handful of other non-white students. She really stood out.

A lot of people were racist towards Edmonia. They didn’t like how she looked and thought that made her a bad person. One night, Edmonia was attacked by a racist mob.

Edmonia couldn’t graduate from her degree because of all the violence against her. But she didn’t let that stop her.

She moved to Boston and began working on her craft: sculpting.

It was very unusual for a woman to be a sculptor. In Victorian times, people thought there were things only men could do. They thought only men should be able to be sculptors. They thought women should stick to sewing or painting. But Edmonia knew sculpting was her gift and she wanted to work hard at it.

Three male teachers refused to help her learn sculpting because she was a black woman. Finally, she managed to find one teacher, Edward August Brackett, who could show her how to make marble portrait busts.

Edmonia was very interested in famous abolitionists. That means people who fought for the end of slavery. John Brown and Colonel Robert Gould Shaw were two very brave men who fought for the rights of black people in America.

Edmonia Lewis, 'The Bust of Robert Gould Shaw', 1867

Edmonia made a marble bust of Colonel Robert and his family loved it. In fact, a lot of people loved it and she had to make lots and lots of them. She sold one hundred portrait busts of him!

Finally, in 1864, Edmonia opened her first exhibition to show everyone her sculptures.

Edmonia made enough money from her exhibition that she could travel to Rome in Italy, where she really wanted to live.

In America, people always spoke about her colour. In Italy, she thought people could judge her just on her art and not be so interested in what she looked like.

Edmonia Lewis, 'Forever Free', 1867

In 1866, Edmonia set up her own space in a studio. The studio had once been owned by Antonio Canova 100 years earlier. He was one of the most famous Italian sculptors of all time!

Edmonia worked on every single bit of the art process, and didn’t want to hire people to help her. She wanted to make sure that when people saw her work, they knew it was done by her.

Edmonia Lewis, 'The Arrow Maker,' 1872

Even though she often created sculptures that looked Italian, and wore big robes like Canova’s sculptures, Edmonia also never forgot her African American and Native American past. In ‘Forever Free,’ she depicted an African American man and women breaking the bonds of slavery. In another sculpture, ‘The Arrow Maker’ she showed a Native American father showing his daughter how to make an arrow.  

Edmonia’s sculptures became so well known that tourists began coming to her studio to see her artworks. She held many exhibitions in America and in Italy. In 1876, she created a huge marble sculpture that weighed about as much as two huge horses. It was called ‘The Death of Cleopatra’ was elegant and powerful. She showed it an a huge exhibition with lots of other artists in Philadelphia. Everyone agreed her Cleopatra sculpture was on of the best pieces there.

Edmonia Lewis, 'The Death of Cleopatra', 1876

Edmonia lived happily ever after in London.

Her legacy is important because she showed that despite others telling her she couldn’t be a sculptor because she was an ethnic minority and a woman, she did it anyway and became internationally successful.

Oberlin College

Oberlin College, where she was forced to leave university, have taken her success and tried to make change. They have named a centre after her for women and transgender people, helping others who may have been judged for their race or sex, trying to make a world where no one will have to go through Edmonia’s hardship.

 “I have a strong sympathy for all women who have struggled and suffered.”

—Edmonia Lewis

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Epigram: Anti Art Counterpart, Thebes

Taking my mechanical engineer boyfriend to Spike Island was a risky move. I thought he was ready. I was wrong. 

This article was originally published on Epigram 

Taking my mechanical engineer boyfriend to Spike Island was a risky move. There’s scientists who appreciate the arts. There’s scientists who don’t really appreciate the arts. And then there’s Zac who thought the Odyssey was written by Homer J Simpson.

We’ve braved more traditional art galleries in the past. He coped pretty well with the National Gallery, using Snapchat to face swap with Rembrandt, which you could argue is a postmodern interpretation of the medium of the self portrait. I thought it was maybe time he took on contemporary, conceptual art. I thought he was ready. I was wrong.

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Spike Island is a gallery and studio space in Bristol, showcasing contemporary artists’ works. Currently, Benoît Maire’s Thebes is on display. Spike Island describes the artist as a ‘visual philosopher’ whose works ‘question the origin of humankind and the objects we produce.’ In other words, this was arty fartyness at its best, a lot of abstract paintings and abstract ideas.

As soon as we walk in, Zac tries to get to grips with what he’s seeing. The entire first room is filled with paintings of clouds, apparently ‘drawing a parallel between painting and the ever changing forms of clouds.’ There’s canvas after canvas of splodges of colour, each one a slightly different interpretation of the concept, moving between figuration and abstraction. Zac looks around hopefully and eventually says ‘so this is… Impressionism?’ Nope, but nice try.

I begin to try to explain the difference between the 19^th century art movement and Benoît Maire’s artworks, suggesting that there may indeed be some parallels… but Zac’s already wondered off to the far side of the room, standing far too close to a painting. I grab his arm to pull him back, just because there isn’t a rope to stop you touching it doesn’t mean they want your nose impaling the canvas.

Zac is looking at the splodges of paint and rubbing his chin thoughtfully, ‘I sense a common theme,’ he says after a while.

‘Oh yes?’ I say encouragingly. Will he have spotted the references to abstract expressionism, the drawing on action painting, the blurring of the lines between imagination and reality?

‘There’s these big blimps in all of them.’ Says Zac, point at a particularly large purple splodge.

‘Er, yes, I suppose there are.’ I mutter, trying to think of a way to relate this back to an art historical discourse but Zac’s already plodding off into the next room.

We’re met by a video playing on loop. It’s an amalgamation of a few different clips, but it mainly has Maria Sharapova repeatedly hitting a tennis ball whilst the sound echoes around the gallery.

‘I would actually go insane if I had to listen to this every day.’ Zac says, far too loudly. The volunteer whose job that literally is gives us a glare and we scuttle away.

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Zac starts laughing next to one particular piece. The photo shows a man leaning over a big glass ball, holding a kind of metal measuring tool.

‘I love that.’ Zac’s saying gleefully. The art historian within me is delighted. Okay, so the cloud paintings weren’t for him, and the tennis video was a bit weird but maybe this will speak to him.

‘What do you like about it?’

‘It’s so ridiculous. That’s a caliper, it would obviously never be able to measure the diameter of that sphere, I mean, look the arms of the caliper are way too narrow…’

No way have we come to an art gallery only for him to explain something sciencey to me. On to the next room.

It is full of objects in various arrangements, industrial tools, found objects and Maire’s own artworks. The guide tells us the room questions ‘the status of the object, and how we categorise form in art, culture and nature.’ Zac, helpfully, categorises it all as rubbish. 

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The final room is a screening of the word origin, a film showing a man going about his mundane life. We watch the video and I’m completely bemused. Surely Zac will be too.

‘I noticed a theme.’ He says.

‘Oh, yeah?’ I ask, dreading his response.

‘Eggs. There’s a lot of eggs in the film, I think it’s talking about the never-ending cycle of life.’

I look down at the exhibition guide, gobsmacked. He’s right.

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We leave the exhibition and I’m a bit shell-shocked, could my anti-art boyfriend really have spotted something that I didn’t? Does this change the whole dynamic of our relationship? As we go, he points to a fire extinguisher, ‘So, what? Am I supposed to accept this is art, too?’

Maybe things are back to normal after all. 

For a more intelligent response to the exhibition check out Epigram’s review.

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Women of Art History: Cara

Cara Romero. 1977-. America.
Photographer.

How many artists can you name? Chances are, you'll have named many more men than women. From the moment we are children, most of the artists and artworks we are exposed to are created by or about men. It's time to rebalance the scales and open up the artistic 'canon', introducing more women and ethnic minorities into the widely known narrative of art history. Here, I'll be trying to do just that in the style of a children's story, introducing you to one more woman from art and art history who, until now, you might not have known. 

Once upon a time, a little girl was raised on the Chemehuevi Valley Indian Reservation, California. The tribe that lived there had been nomadic residents of the Mojave Desert and the Colorado River for thousands of years, but had lost their traditional lands when the Federal government declared them public domain. The Reservation was all they were given. 

The little girl was called Cara Romero, the daughter of a Chemehuevi father and German-Irish mother. In her culture, women were taught that they had a powerful, innate strength as life givers and mothers. They were always respected as equals in their society. Her people also had a powerful bond with nature and the land. Cara began discovering her talent with a camera, snapping moments wherever she went, and telling the stories behind what she saw. 

Cara went on to study photography at both the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe and Oklahoma State University and studied cultural anthropology at the University of Houston. She wanted to make sure she had studied her craft as much as she could. Sure enough, her photography developed into beautiful, dramatic, romantic artworks. Yet, they were also very powerful responses to complex social, political issues. 

Cara

She always remembered what her tribe had taught her, that women are strong. In many of her photographs, she dealt with the interplay of femininity, Native American history and power. In one photograph, she imagined how a real Native American doll might look. As a child, Cara had played with dolls and noticed that those described as 'Indian' never reflected the dignity and richness of her culture. But in her photograph, she dressed her 'doll' in an amazing powwow dress that could jingle when she danced. This doll was not afraid to be different and embrace her culture, jingly dress and all. 

Cara Romero, 'Wakeah'

A long time ago, in 1940, the Federal authorities had taken a lot of Chemehuevi land for a dam project and covered nearly 8000 acres of traditional Nuwuvi land in water. In a triptych piece, (which means 3 photographs shown together), Cara dealt with these issues of environment and destruction. She captured Native American figures suspended underwater, perhaps discussing the suspension of their culture in America. Not allowed to flourish, but also not destroyed. In the last photograph, above the surface was an oil rig, showing how much the Western world impacted on the environment. Cara came from a tribe who so valued their land and life-giving water, and wanted to show how fragile human relations are with their environment. 

Cara Romero 'Oil Boom' 

Today, Cara has children of her own, Paris and Noel, and is married to another artist, Diego. They are living happily ever after... but also changing the world one photograph at a time, showing how rich and beautiful Native American culture is, and how powerful a message can be from just one image.  

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Flames of Perseverence

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What Have The Arts Got To Do With Freshers Week?

Originally published on Epigram. 

As the most mellow and soothing artist of all time, Bob Ross, once said ‘you need the dark in order to show the light.’

Although he probably wasn’t thinking of Freshers’ Week when he said it, this quote can easily be applied. In the first week of Uni, there may be some highs and lows. The one thing to make sure you have more highs than lows? Well, art of course. Here’s the many ways art can guide you through the first week.

 The Art of Room Décor

Probably the most important one. Did you even take a gap year if you don’t have a tapestry hanging over your bed? Do you even have any friends if you don’t have photos of them perfectly blue-tacked on the wall? Are you even able to study if you don’t have Instagram-worthy stationery arranged on your desk at the start of term? Make sure to get this one right as it will define you forever. That’s a lie, no one pays as much attention to your bedroom as you do, and deep down you’ll know that, but it won’t stop you from Pinteresting colour schemes for weeks before hand, and asking your parents desperately if they have any old records you can display on your shelves to show you’re musically knowledgeable. 

... Winnie the Pooh pillows and Impressionist paintings are cool, right? 

The Art of Self Reinvention

This is it folks. You’ve known pretty much the same people since you were 11, and most of your friends remember the time you wet yourself in the middle of a club like a cast member on Geordie Shore. Never before have you had such an opportunity to reinvent yourself and start over. Be who you want to be. This is a fine and important art, how to present yourself exactly how you want without coming across as too try-hard. Wear frames with clear glass in them to come across as ‘bookish’. Wear fake tan every day but tell people it’s natural. Wear t-shirts with obscure band names or geographical places to seem cultured. Except on the fourth day of Freshers you’ll get smashed playing Never Have I Ever and tell all your flat mates the weeing story and all your hard work will be for nothing.

The first Never Have I Ever will reveal all. 

The Art of Fashion

You’ll spend a good few hours contemplating what to wear on the first night out, and will borrow so much from your flat mates that you all enter SWX wearing an amalgamation of everyone’s wardrobes. You’ll soon decide all the clothes you wore back home aren’t Bristol enough and you’ll head for the vintage shops on Park Street. By November, you’ll realise you’re broke and maybe £80 isn’t that reasonable for a sustainable reworked revamped vintage shirt with a hole in the pocket. Anyway, by TB2, you’ll have given up completely on looking good for Uni and you’ll have finally resorted to rolling out of bed, into your coat and out the door.

The Art of the Arts

The only thing on this list that’s actually artistic: the arts in Bristol! Get acquainted with Banksy, go to a play, drag someone to listen to a free performance on Gloucester Road. Not only will the activities make you more rounded and arty –always a good goal- but they’ll be a great way to meet people and have something to do together, other than going to Spoons. It’ll also help to know a little bit about the graffiti culture in Bristol because it’ll invariably come up at family functions when an uncle tries to come up with something they know about Bristol. Yes, it’s where the ‘Boris and Trump kissing’ mural was. Yes, I got my septum done in Pierced Up, where Banksy did a free artwork. Yes, my Dad’s gonna kill me for getting my septum done.  

The first time walking into Wills Memorial Building 

The Art of Self Love

And in amongst all of this stressing, shopping, Pinteresting and aspirational living, you’ll need to make time for the trickiest art of all, actually staying true to yourself throughout! Don’t be too hard on yourself if you can’t find your feet at first. The best bit about Freshers’ is everyone is doing exactly what you’re doing, and by the end you’ll have realised your new mates might also be artists of their own reinventions. Wait it out and you’ll see that under their £100 Fila jackets, most people are also wondering how to navigate the highs and lows.

Bob Ross also once said ‘just go out and talk to a tree. Make friends with it.’ I’d recommend maybe not doing that in Freshers’ Week.

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