Celebrating International Women’s Day Learn More About the Women Behind the Work

Happy International Women’s Day! We are celebrating by highlighting a selection of work by women artists currently on view at the Ogden Museum!

Minnie Evans

Minnie Evans, 1950, Untitled (Green Forms), Ink, crayon and collage on paper, Gift of the Roger Houston Ogden Collection, 2003.01

Minnie Evans was an African American folk artist, surrealist and visionary who was born in Pender County, North Carolina in 1892. Evans did not begin to draw or paint until the age of 43 and she created her first pieces of art on a scrap paper bag. Five years later, she decided to dedicate herself to recording her dreams through art. Evans used a variety of media in her work, ranging from ink, graphite, wax crayon, watercolor and oil, to create her complex and brightly colored works of art. Today Evans is recognized as one of the most important visionary folk artists of the 20th century and her work is collected by many museums and collectors across the world. ⁣⁣

Evans work is currently on view in the Ogden’s latest exhibition, Vernacular Voices: Self-taught, Outsider and Visionary Art from the Permanent Collection, until July 14, 2019.

Kathleen Blackshear

Kathleen Blackshear, Portrait of Robert Gould, 1932, Oil on canvas, Gift of the Roger Houston Ogden Collection

Kathleen Blackshear is known for her American Scene and Depression Era regionalist style portraits of African Americans. She became a unique teacher of the arts by encouraging her students not only to visit art galleries, but to also spend time in museums of natural history, zoos and cultural institutions for inspiration.

Come see Blackshear’s work on view now at the O in our Permanent Collection galleries!

Celestia Morgan

Celestia Morgan, Sky Maps: Titusville, 2017, Archival pigment print

Celestia Morgan’s body of work titled “Redline” is a meditation on the history of systematic, racially-biased housing discrimination in her hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. Her “Sky Maps” combine blue skies with bold white outlines of city maps to create a narrative that there are no predetermined demarcations or borders in the sky.⁣

You can come see Morgan’s works on view in New Southern Photography until March 10, 2019.

Lin Emery

Lin Emery, Mitre, No Date, Aluminum with lacquer coating, Gift of Pat and Denver Gray

Lin Emery is a visual artist based in New Orleans. Inspired by the inner metal supports for sculptures, Emery learned welding and casting. She created a series of abstract metal works, including her large-scale wind-powered kinetic sculptures, like the one pictured above. Her artworks are inspired by forces of nature and since 1972 all of her art has been kinetic and activated by water, magnets, motors or wind.  

You can come see Emery’s sculptural work currently on view on the Museum’s 5th floor terrace.

Happy International Women’s Day!