In celebration of the 250th anniversary of the United States, 250 Years: American Women Artists and the Nation's Story traces the nation's artistic history through the remarkable achievements of American women artists. Spanning from the Revolutionary era to the present day, the exhibition presents works from every decade of the nation's history, revealing the enduring and often overlooked contributions of women to the development of American art.
Beginning with eighteenth-century silhouettes and early nineteenth-century portrait miniatures, the exhibition follows the emergence of professional women artists as they forged careers despite significant social and institutional barriers. Through portraiture, landscape, still life, abstraction, sculpture, and contemporary practice, the exhibition illustrates the evolution of American art alongside the nation's own cultural and historical transformation.
Featuring works by more than thirty artists, including Sarah Harrington, Sarah Miriam Peale, Mary Cassatt, Helen Lundeberg, Nell Blaine, Mercedes Matter, Lee Bontecou, Diana Kurz, Sherron Francis, Harmony Hammond, Lynda Benglis, and Teruko Yokoi, 250 Years offers a sweeping survey of artistic innovation across two and a half centuries. As the United States commemorates its semiquincentennial, the exhibition invites visitors to reconsider the nation's history through the accomplishments of women whose creative legacies have profoundly shaped American art.