I don’t know about you, but only a few years ago, the names Julie Hart Beers and Jane Peterson didn’t automatically spark a visual of their work with the same immediacy as, say, Mary Cassatt or Cecilia Beaux. But now they do. For Beers, it is her masterful Hudson River School landscapes; and for Peterson, impressionistic depictions of Venice and other scenes from her extensive travels, as well as floral still lifes, including the lovely work on this issue’s cover.
To me, this means our collective efforts to bring the names, stories and artwork of forgotten but deserving women artists into the vernacular is working! And it is such a privilege that we—the galleries, museums, auction houses, scholars, collectors and the media—get to play a part in this tide shift and be witnesses to change.
The legacy of women artists, from the famed to the as-of-yet obscure, is celebrated throughout the November/December magazine. But this issue’s focus extends beyond the painters and sculptors themselves to the women behind the artists, men and women alike.
Our feature Besty’s World on Page 34 explores the tremendous influence of Betsy James Wyeth on her husband, painter Andrew Wyeth. As their youngest son, artist Jamie Wyeth, put it, “She could have co-signed the paintings.”
One of my favorite anecdotes in this issue, and a reminder that progress doesn’t mean our work is done, comes from Jennifer Krieger, owner of Hawthorne Fine Art, a gallery that specializes in historic women artists, and who we interview in our Tête-à-Tête column on Page 54.
“I have been asked from time to time about the existence of a Mr. Hawthorne, the imagined man behind the name of our gallery and assumed owner,” shares Krieger. “But since I named the gallery after the author Nathaniel Hawthorne, and I am the gallery owner, I explain that Mr. Hawthorne as owner of Hawthorne Fine Art doesn’t exist, and express that it is more than okay for a business to be run by women. I would encourage other women in this business and in other fields to feel the same conviction.”
Sarah Gianelli
Managing Editor
sgianelli@americanartcollector.com
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