America, 1900 to 1930 933U
ntil the 20th century, the dearth of women artists was often
due to professional institutions that restricted women’s access
to artistic training. For example, the proscription against women
participating in life-drawing classes, a staple of academic artistic
training, in effect denied women the opportunity to become profes-
sional artists. Further, the absence of women from the art historical
canon is also partly because art historians have not considered as
“high art” many of the art objects women have traditionally pro-
duced (for example, quilts or basketry).
By the early 20th century, many of the impediments to women
becoming recognized artists had been removed. Today, women are a
major presence in the art world. One development in the early 20th
century that laid the groundwork for this change was the prominent
role women played as art patrons. These “art matrons” provided
financial, moral, and political support to cultivate the advancement
of the arts in America. Among these women were Gertrude Vander-
bilt Whitney, Lillie P. Bliss, Mary Quinn Sullivan, Abby Aldrich
Rockefeller, Isabella Stewart Gardner, Peggy Guggenheim, and Jane
Stanford.*
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942) was a practicing
sculptor and enthusiastic collector. To assist young American artists
such as Robert Henri and John Sloan (FIG. 35-31) to exhibit their
work, she opened the Whitney Studio in 1914. By 1929, dissatisfied
with the recognition accorded young, progressive American artists,
she offered her entire collection of 500 works to the Metropolitan
Museum of Art. Her offer rejected, she founded her own museum,
the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. She chose
as the first director a visionary and energetic woman, Juliana Force
(1876–1948), who inaugurated a pioneering series of monographs
on living American artists and organized lecture series by influential
art historians and critics. Through the efforts of these two women,
the Whitney Museum became a major force in American art.
A trip to Paris in 1920 whetted the interest of Peggy Guggen-
heim (1898–1979) in avant-garde art. Like Whitney, she collected art
and eventually opened a gallery in England to exhibit the work of in-
novative artists. She continued her support for avant-garde art after
her return to the United States. Guggenheim’s New York gallery,
called Art of This Century, was instrumental in advancing the ca-
reers of many artists, including her husband, Max Ernst (FIG. 35-47).
She eventually moved her art collection to a lavish Venetian palace,
where the public can still view these important artworks.
Other women contributed significantly to the arts, including Lil-
lie P. Bliss (1864–1931), Mary Quinn Sullivan (1877–1939), and Abby
Aldrich Rockefeller (1874–1948). Philanthropists, art collectors, and
educators, these visionary and influential women saw the need for a
museum to collect and exhibit modernist art. Together they estab-
lished the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1929, which
became (and continues to be) the most influential museum of mod-
ern art in the world (see “The Museum of Modern Art,” page 954).
Isabella Stewart Gardner (1840–1924) and Jane Stanford
(1828–1905) also undertook the ambitious project of founding mu-
seums. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, established
in 1903, contains an impressive collection of art that is comprehen-
sive in scope. The Stanford Museum, the first American museum
west of the Mississippi, got its start in 1905 on the grounds of Stan-
ford University, which Leland Stanford Sr. and Jane Stanford
founded after the tragic death of their son. The Stanford Museum
houses a wide range of objects, including archaeological and ethno-
graphic artifacts. These two driven women committed much of their
time, energy, and financial resources to ensure the success of these
museums. Both were intimately involved in the day-to-day opera-
tions of their institutions.
The museums these women established flourish today, attesting
to the extraordinary vision of these “art matrons” and the remark-
able contributions they made to the advancement of art in the
United States.* Art historian Wanda Corn coined the term “art matronage” in the catalog
Cultural Leadership in America: Art Matronage and Patronage (Boston: Isabella
Stewart Gardner Museum, 1997).Art “Matronage” in America
ART AND SOCIETYported the efforts of American artists to pursue modernist ideas (see
“Art ‘Matronage’ in America,” above).
Painting and Sculpture
The art scene in America before the establishment of a significant
and consistent dialogue with European modernists was, of course,
quite varied. However, many American artists active in the early 20th
century were committed to presenting what they considered to be a
realistic, unvarnished look at life. In this regard, their work parallels
that of the French Realists in the mid-19th century (see Chapter 30).
JOHN SLOAN AND THE EIGHTOne group of American
Realist artists, The Eight, consisted of eight painters who gravitated
into the circle of the influential and evangelical artist and teacher
Robert Henri (1865–1929). Henri urged his followers to make “pic-
tures from life,”^18 and accordingly, these artists pursued with zeal the
production of images depicting the rapidly changing urban land-
scape of New York City. Because these vignettes often captured the
bleak and seedy aspects of city life, The Eight eventually became
known as the Ash Can School. Some critics referred to them as “the
apostles of ugliness.”
A prominent member of The Eight was John Sloan(1871–1951).
A self-described “incorrigible window watcher,”^19 Sloan constantly
wandered the streets of New York, observing human drama. He fo-
cused much of his attention on the working class, which he per-
ceived as embodying the realities of life. So sympathetic was Sloan to
the working class that he joined the Socialist Party in 1909 and even-
tually ran for public office on the Socialist ticket. In paintings such as
Sixth Avenue and Thirtieth Street (FIG. 35-31), Sloan revealed his
ability to capture both the visual and social realities of American ur-
ban life shortly after the turn of the century. When he painted this
image in 1907, Sloan was living on West 23rd Street, on the outskirts