This story (and accompanying photo) so intrigued me that I checked into the history of this unique woman: Hailed as the first professional African-American and Native-American sculptor, Mary Edmonia Lewis had little training but overcame numerous obstacles to become a revered and respected artist....Following a childhood that saw her roam the woods with Chippewa Indians, Lewis found her way to Oberlin College in Ohio, thanks to, it seems, the support and encouragement of a successful older brother.Oberlin was a hot bed for the abolitionist movement, a facet of school life that did not escape Lewis and would greatly influence her later work....But life at Oberlin came to a violent end when Lewis was falsely accused of poisoning two white classmates. Captured and beaten by a white mob, Lewis recovered from the attack and then escaped to Boston, Massachusetts, after the charges against her were dropped....the money she earned from the sale of copies of (a) bust allowed her to move to Rome, Italy—home to a number of expatriate American artists, including several women.In Italy, Lewis continued her artistic ascendency. Her work over the next several decades moved between African-American themes to work influenced by her devout Catholicism.One of her most prized works was Forever Free (1867), a sculpture depicting a black man and woman emerging from the bonds of slavery. Another piece, The Arrow Maker (1866), draws on her Native-American roots and shows a father teaching his young daughter how to make an arrow. In addition to her religion-themed pieces, Lewis created busts of American leaders such as Ulysses S. Grant and Abraham Lincoln.Perhaps her most famous work was a commanding depiction of the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra, titled The Death of Cleopatra. Met with critical acclaim when she showed it at the Philadelphia Exposition in 1876 and in Chicago two years later, the two-ton sculpture never returned to Italy with its creator because Lewis couldnt afford the shipping costs. It was placed in storage and only really rediscovered several decades after her death....Much like her childhood, Lewiss final years are shrouded in mystery...Speculation indicates that she died in her adoptive city of Rome , Italy, sometime around 1911, but even that is unclear.In recent decades, however, Lewiss life and art has received well-deserved respect. Her pieces are now part of the permanent collections of the Howard University Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 17:55:43 +0000
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