Description:

Edith Longstreth Wood
American, (1885-1967)
Non-Objective
watercolor on paper
signed lower left and titled lower right.
Provenance: From a private collector, Indianapolis.
Schwarz & Son, Philadelphia gallery label verso.

From the Archives of AskArt: In the early years of the 20th century, the Philadelphia art world was a place where the children of rich, WASP families could mingle with the children of poor immigrants. Edith, born into the wealthy, Longstreth family, attended the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. So did my great-uncle, Maurice Molarsky, the son of a poor tailor, from Philadelphia's Jewish ghetto. Maurice would later establish himself as one of Philadelphia's leading portrait painters and set up an elegant studio near Rittenhouse Square. So art helped some immigrants get a toehold in the world of Philadelphia's famously snooty upper class. And it allowed some members of the elite to see a part of life they'd barely imagined before.

For Philadelphia artists, there was the obligatory apprenticeship in Europe. As early as 1866, Mary Cassatt was in France, honing her Impressionist vision alongside Degas and his contemporaries. Generations of Philadelphia students would follow. Around 1905, my great-uncle Maurice won a Pennsylvania Academy scholarship to study in Paris, where he adopted the palate of Rembrandt and the ambitions of Sargent. His brother Abram tagged along and returned home to paint color-saturated American landscapes in a dreamy idiom all his own. Edith didn't arrive in Paris until 1928, when she was in her early forties. That was well after her husband Billy had died and she was launched as a painter. But like everyone else, she finally got there and was influenced by what she saw. More modernist than the other members of our Quaker-Jewish art clan, Edith did work that was muscular in design, thin on paint, and shaped by Cubism.

At home, she became a member of The Philadelphia Ten, a group of women painters and sculptors who banded together to promote their work and carve a niche for themselves in the man's world of art. They were early feminists in both style and substance. And they were largely successful in their project--to become independent and support themselves as artists.

  • Dimensions: 14"H x 10"W (sheet), 26 1/2"H x 21 1/2"W (frame)
  • Medium: watercolor on paper

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February 19, 2022 11:00 AM EST
Indianapolis, IN, US

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