Wendy Kaplan – Women and the Arts and Crafts Movement: “What Can a Woman Do?”
Today, we consider education, career choices, and fulfillment through one’s work to be fundamental rights for women. A little more than a hundred years ago, however, these were mostly only utopian dreams. At the end of the nineteenth century, social reformers, advocates of women’s rights, and followers of the Arts and Crafts movement addressed the question of work for women designers and craftspeople.
Join us as Wendy Kaplan, Curator of Decorative Arts and Design at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, examines the role of women designers in the Anglo/American Arts and Crafts movement, focusing on their leadership in social and economic reform as well as the restrictions on their full participation.
Wendy Kaplan has been at LACMA since 2001 as the Department Head and Curator of Decorative Arts and Design. Previously, she held curatorial positions at the Wolfsonian-Florida International University in Miami, Glasgow Museums in Scotland, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. A leading expert on late 19th- and 20th-century design, she has authored, co-authored, or edited many books on the subject such as Found in Translation: Design in California and Mexico, 1915-1985 (2017), California Design, 1930–1965: “Living in a Modern Way” (2011), The Arts & Crafts Movement in Europe and America: Design for the Modern World (2004), Leading “The Simple Life”: The Arts and Crafts Movement in Britain (1999), Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1996), Designing Modernity: The Arts of Reform and Persuasion, 1885–1945 (1995), The Arts and Crafts Movement (1991); ), and “The Art that is Life”: The Arts and Crafts Movement in America (1987)), as well as organized major exhibitions on these subjects.
Seating is limited and pre-registration is required. The lecture will be held in the Greatbatch Pavilion Visitor Center, an accessible event space.
Information and ReservationsDESIGN ALOUD is a series of conversations, screenings, and performances exploring the power of contemporary design in harmony with nature. The series is presented by M&T Bank.