The life and work of painter Eve Drewelowe (1899-1988) are celebrated in a new digital collection created by the University of Iowa Libraries and the School of Art and Art History. This pioneering artist, who in 1924 received the UI’s first Master’s degree in studio arts, is the focus of the Eve Drewelowe Digital Collection, available online at http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/drewelowe .

To unveil the digital collection and to celebrate women’s history month, the UI Libraries will host a reception from 4:00 to 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday, March 3, 2010, in the North Exhibition Hall of the Main Library. Joni Kinsey, Curator of the Drewelowe art collection, will speak briefly on the artist’s work and the significance of the collection.

In addition to her pioneering role as an artist trained in a university and a college of liberal arts, Drewelowe represents another “uniquely American phenomenon,” according to UI School of Art and Art History Professor Wallace Tomasini:

[A] farmer’s daughter in a sparsely populated agricultural area, far removed from great urban art centers, can indulge in her desire to become an artist; can enjoy the benefits of an education which introduces her to the literature, the history and the art of the great civilizations of the world, and can have the freedom to be an individual, to be independent and to do the unusual. From the beginning, Eve Drewelowe was a rebel, a challenger of complacency and the expected role career model for women. [from the book Eve Drewelowe. University of Iowa School of Art and Art History, 1988.]

Read the full press release:
http://www.news-releases.uiowa.edu/2010/February/021510drewelowe.html