Symposium papers
Published on
Les Polonaises s’organisent : les premières expositions de femmes artistes polonaises à l’orée du XXe siècle
Ewa Bobrowska
Abstract
At the end of the 19th century, a hundred years after the Third Partition, Poland was a nation dispossessed of independence and dominated by foreign powers (Russia, Prussia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire). Despite conditions that were highly unfavorable for the development of a national art, this period benefitted from an exceptional proliferation of artistic talent. Confronted by a lack of structures for arts promotion, education, and commerce, artists organized themselves in groups to promote their work. Women artists, although deprived of training opportunities, started to professionalize and establish their own groups. The challenges surrounding the first exhibition of the Circle of Polish Women Artists in 1899 will be the subject of our analysis.
Art historian and psychologist, Ewa Bobrowska (Ph.D. University of Paris–Panthéon–Sorbonne) is a specialist of nineteenth– and twentieth–century art with a particular emphasis on Polish artists abroad, especially in France, and Polish art in an international context. She has curated numerous exhibitions in France and Poland. Currently Associate Program Officer of Academic Programs at the Terra Foundation for American Art in Paris, she was previously chief curator of the art collection of the Bibliothèque Polonaise in Paris.
