Philadelphia School of Design for Women

Edwin Forrest House, the home of the Pennsylvania School of Design for Women, Philadelphia

Philadelphia School of Design for Women was an art school for women in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was the largest art school for women in the country, directed by Emily Sartain, and its faculty included Robert Henri, Samuel Murray and Daniel Garber. It merged into what is now the Moore College of Art and Design.

History

Sarah Worthington King Peter, wife of the British consul in Philadelphia, established an industrial arts school in her home in 1848 to teach women without a means of supporting themselves a trade. The school taught lithography, wood carving, and design, such as for household items like carpets and wallpaper. Peter's husband died soon after she established the school and she returned to her Cincinnati, Ohio home.

In 1850, Peter wrote to the Franklin Institute about her drawing class of some 20 young women becoming a "co-operative, but separate branch" of the Institute. The Franklin Institute established and supervised the Philadelphia School of Design for Women from 1850 to 1853. A group of 17 men were designated the incorporators of the school in 1853. Elliott Cresson was among these 17 directors, and was elected president at the first meeting. It was the country's largest art school for women and its students included Emily Sartain and Jessie Willcox Smith.

Elizabeth Croasdale was the school's principal before Emily Sartain took the position in 1886. Sartain was the school's leader until 1920. She implemented life-drawing classes at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, using draped male and nude women models, which was revolutionary at the time for women artists. Sartain created a professional program that was built upon technical and lengthy training and high standards. The women were taught to create works of art based upon three-dimensional and human forms, based upon her training in Paris and at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. She was responsible for introducing important faculty members such as Robert Henri, Samuel Murray and Daniel Garber. In 1892, Robert Henri began teaching at the school. William Innes Homer said, "A born teacher, Henri enjoyed immediate success at the school."

Nina de Angeli Walls wrote,

As Sartain's career illustrates, art schools conferred professional status in a cultural field once dominated by men. Women artists used formal schooling to counter the accusation of amateurism frequently leveled at them. Nineteenth century design schools were the first institutions to offer professional certification for women in such careers as art education, fabric design, or magazine illustration; hence, the schools opened unprecedented paths to female economic independence.

In 1932 it merged into the Moore Institute of Art, Science, and Industry. It is now the Moore College of Art and Design, which offers both a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree and a Master of Arts in Art Education.

Faculty

• Rae Sloan Bredin
• Daniel Garber
• Robert Henri
• Samuel Murray
• Leopold Seyffert

Students

• Elenore Abbott
• Theresa Bernstein
• Mary-Russell Ferrell Colton
• Florence Esté
• Lillian Genth
• Bessie Pease Gutmann
• Charlotte Harding
• Ella Sophonisba Hergesheimer
• Alice Neel
• Anne Parrish
• Deborah Griscom Passmore
• Katharine Pyle
• Paulette Van Roekens
• Jessie Willcox Smith
• Alice Barber Stephens
• Louise E. Baker

See also

• Timeline of women's colleges in the United States