After the painting by Rosa Bonheur in the New York Metropolitan Museum
of Art.
]
Another painting, “The Monarch of the Glen,” received much praise at the
World’s Columbian Exposition.
In just appreciation of her genius Rosa Bonheur was proposed in 1853 for
the Cross of the Legion of Honor, but because of her sex the decoration
was withheld until 1865.—
One of the four daughters of an early German pioneer of California, who
distinguished themselves in different lines of activity, =Anne Elizabeth
Klumpke= followed in the footsteps of Rosa Bonheur, of whom she became a
close friend, and who, in appreciation of her great talent, bequeathed
to her her beautiful chateau as well as her entire fortune.
The second half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th Century
produced a surprising abundance of women artists, some of whom gained
the most coveted prizes and medals offered by the great annual
exhibitions in Paris, London, Berlin, Munich and other centers of art.
Clara Erskine Clemens in her book “Women in the Fine Arts” has compiled
notes about several hundred of them, without enumerating them all. To
mention a few of the most excellent, we name of the German artists
=Louise Parmentier Begas=, =Tina Blau=, =Dora Hitz=, =Lucia von Gelder=,
=Herminie von Janda=, =Countess Marie Kalckreuth=, =Minna Stock=, =Toni
Stadler=, =Frieda Ritter=, =Margarethe von Schack=, =Vilma Parlaghy=,
and =Margarethe Waldau=.
Italy names among its best modern painters =Alceste Campriani=, =Ada
Negri=, =Juana Romani=, =Erminia de Sanctis=, and =Clelia Bompiani=.
The French extol the genius of =Louise Labé=, =Marceline
Desbordes-Valmore= and =Louise Ackermann=.
Belgium and Holland number among their women artists =Therese
Schwartze=, =Adele Kindt= and =Henriette Ronner=; Spain points with
pride to the works of =Fernanda Frances y Arribas=, =Adele Gines= and
=Antonia de Banuelos=. Denmark’s famous artist, =Elizabet Jerichau
Baumann=, is remembered especially for her magnificent painting
“Christian Martyrs in the Catacombs”; Switzerland has two portraitists
of the first order, =Louise Catherine Breslau= and =Aimée Rapin=, while
Russia produced in =Marie Bashkirttseff= an artist of rare ability.
Perhaps in no other country is the number of female artists so large as
in England. We will name only a few of them. =Laura Alma Tadema= was the
gifted daughter of the famous artist Laurenz Alma Tadema. =Margaret
Sarah Carpenter= won wide reputation as a gifted portrait painter.
=Ethel Wright’s= beautiful painting “The Song of the Ages” belongs to
the best examples of English art. =Clara Montalba= is favorably known
for her splendid scenes of Venice, and landscapes of the Adriatic
coasts. =Elizabeth Thompson= demonstrated by many excellent sketches and
pictures that women are not afraid to make a specialty of battle scenes.
Ambitious American women are likewise hard at work gaining honor and
laurels in the various fields of art. The morning promises fair, as
there are already many shining names upon the scroll. To begin with one
of the middle of the last century, we mention =Cornelia Adele Facett=,
whose chief work, “The Election Commission in Open Session,” contains
258 portraits of men and women, prominent in the political, literary,
scientific and social circles of their time. It adorns the Senate
Chamber in the Capitol at Washington.
The most brilliant woman artist of the United States is without question
=Cecilia Beaux=, a Philadelphian, who, as a portrait painter, compares
with the very best of any nation. Her portrait of a “Girl in White,”
owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, verifies what a
critic said about her: “Miss Beaux has approached the task of painting
the society woman of to-day, not as one to whom this type is known only
by exterior, but with a sympathy as complete as a similar tradition and
artistic temperament will allow. Thus she starts with an advantage
denied to all but a very few American portrait painters, and this
explains the instinctive way in which she gives to her pictured subjects
an air of natural ease and good breeding.”
=Sadie Waters=, born in St. Louis, produced a number of religious
paintings, her best and largest showing the Madonna in a bower of roses.
=Violet Oakley= of New Jersey had a prominent part in decorating the new
Capitol at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, one of the most elaborate and
costly public buildings in America. The mural painting “The Romance of
the Founding of the State” in the Governor’s room is her work.
=Anna Mary Richards= excelled as a marine painter. Her large canvass
“The Wild Horses of the Sea” has been especially admired.
=Anny Shaw=, =Grace Hudson=, =Lucie Fairchild Fuller=, =Mary Cassatt=,
and =Matilde Lotz= are among the latest women artists of America,
favorably known for many creditable works.
* * * * *
Although comparatively few women have devoted themselves to sculpture,
there are several among them well worth mentioning.
The first female sculptor of whom anything is known, was =Sabina von
Steinbach=, a daughter of Erwin von Steinbach, the famous architect of
the magnificent cathedral at Strassburg, in Alsace. After the southern
portal of this minster had been erected, Sabina adorned it with the
statues of the apostles, one of which, that of John, held in his hands a
scroll with the following inscription:
“Gratia divinæ pietatis adesto Savinæ,
De petra dura per quam sum facta figura.”
“The grace of God be with thee, O Sabina,
Whose hands from this hard stone have formed my image.”
Nothing further is known about this artist of the end of the 13th
Century.
=Properzia de Rossi= was an Italian woman sculptor, born near the end of
the 15th Century at Bologna or Modena. The first-named city cherishes
still a number of her works, among them a fine marble statue of Count
Guido de Pepoli, and several figures that adorn the three gates of the
facade of St. Petroneus. Vasari in his biographies of celebrated artists
calls her “a virtuous maiden, possessing every merit of her sex,
together with science and learning all men may envy.” And when she died
in 1530, the following epitaph was written in her praise:
Fero splendor di due begit occhi accrebbe
Gia marmi a marmi; e stupor nuovo e strano
Ruvidi marmi delicta mano
Fea dianzi vivi, ahi! morte invidia n’ebbe.
In modern Germany =Anna von Kahle=, =Marie Schlafhorst=, =Dora Beer=,
=Helene Quitmann=, =Henny Geyer Spiegel= and =Lilly Finzelberg= have
done much excellent work.
In France several statues by =Jeanne Hasse=, a Parisian, have been
purchased by the government and presented to various provincial museums.
In England =Mary Thornycroft=, daughter and pupil of John Francis, the
sculptor, has won the praise of the severest critics.
In America =Annie Whitney’s= statue of “Lady Godiva” as well as her
“Africa” and “Roma” have been much praised.
=Helen Farnworth Mears= is well known for her “Fountain of Life.”
=Vinnie Ream Hoxie= modelled a life-size statue of Lincoln, which stands
in the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington. A statue of Farragut in
Farragut Square is by the same artist.
Another American woman sculptor of renown was =Harriet Hosmer=, born in
1830 in Watertown, Mass. Having received her first instruction in Boston
and St. Louis, she went to Rome in 1852 where she became a pupil of
Gibson. Of her various works, the best known are “Beatrice Cenci in Her
Cell”; “Willo’-the-Wisp”; “The Sleeping and the Waking Faun”; and a
colossal statue of “Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra, in Chains.” She exhibited
a statue of Queen Isabella of Spain at the World’s Columbian Exposition.
A statue of “Puck” was so spirited and original, that it was ordered
more than thirty times, is also her work.
=Emma Stebbins= (1815–1882) produced a statue of Horace Mann for Boston,
and a large fountain for Central Park, New York, the subject being “The
Angel of the Waters.”
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has in its collections
several works by =Frances Grimes=, =Laura Gardin=, =Malvina Hoffman=,
and =Evelyn Longman=. Miss Hoffman’s best known work, “The Russian
Bachanale,” showing two almost nude dancing figures in bronze, was in
1919 presented by an American connoisseur to the famous Gardens of the
Luxembourg in Paris.
* * * * *
The United States of America produced also the first women architects.
In 1881 =Louise Bethune= took the lead. Somewhat later the New York firm
=Hands & Gannon=, both members of which were women, designed the plans
for numerous schools, hospitals, and model homes for the working people.
=Elizabeth Holman= in Philadelphia became favorably known for her
excellent designs for theatres, hotels, and cottages. =Mrs. Wagner= in
Pittsburgh made a specialty of university buildings, churches and
chapels.
=Miss Sophie G. Hayden= of Boston, a graduate of the architectural
school of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was the architect
of the beautiful Women’s Pavilion at the World’s Columbian Exposition.
The task of adorning this building with sculptures, emblematic of
woman’s great work in the world, was after an extremely vigorous contest
awarded to =Miss Alice Rideout=, of San Francisco. Women architects
likewise designed the imposing woman’s palaces at the expositions in St.
Louis, Atlanta, and San Francisco. Since then the number of women in
this line of activity has steadily increased. According to the Census of
1910 the United States had in that year 1037 women architects, designers
and draftsmen.
Thus we find woman hard at work in all the various realms of art. And
since her joy in beauty is supreme, we may well expect that her
expression of the highest beauty, the spiritual, will in time favorably
compare with that of her brother-artists.