EVE DREWELOWE (1899-1988)
Teewinot Mountain (3,758 m - 12,330 ft)
United States of America (Wyoming)
In Teeweenot Wyoming (Grand Teton) 1930-40, oil on canvas, University of Iowa
The mountain
Teewinot Mountain (3,758 m - 12,330 ft) is the sixth highest peak in the Teton Range, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. The name of the mountain is derived from the Shoshone Native American word meaning "many pinnacles". The peak is northeast of the Grand Teton, and the two are separated from one another by the Teton Glacier and Mount Owen.
The 40 miles (64 km) long Teton Range is the youngest mountain chain in the Rocky Mountains, and began their uplift 9 million years ago, during the Miocene. Several periods of glaciation have carved Teewinot Mountain and the other peaks of the range into their current shapes. Broken Falls is one of the tallest cascades in Grand Teton National Park and descends 300 feet (91 m) down the eastern slopes of Teewinot Mountain.
The painter
Eve Drewelowe was an American painter. Her career spanned six decades and produced more than 1,000 works of art in oil, watercolor, pen and ink and other media in styles that included impressionism, social realism and abstraction. Despite dabbling with other artistic styles, Drewelowe always showed an inclination toward landscapes. She once said: “My waking thought from an embryo on was my need to be an artist.”
Though never known to have used the word to describe herself, Eve Drewelowe is often considered a feminist artist. Her personal life exhibited feminist themes: the artist retained her maiden name and publicly stated a disinterest in housework and parenting. Drewelowe chose not to take her husband’s last name because in her opinion it should not matter to others whether she is married or not. When Drewelowe and Van Ek returned from their travels and started building a house together. She did not want to be involved in the pleasantries of being the dean’s wife, especially hosting dinner parties, so she specified to have the house built lacking a dining room. She always maintained that she did not want to have children of her own, much to her mother’s dismay.
Although Drewelowe is mainly renowned in Colorado and Iowa, she had solo exhibitions all over the country. Her work was shown at National Association of Women Artists exhibitions, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Denver Art Museum, the National Museum of Women in the Arts and numerous other esteemed institutions. Although women had been in the profession of art for 20–30 years at the beginning of Drewelowe’s career, she still faced opposition and sexism. Critics believe that she could have been much more acclaimed had she not been a woman and had she not fallen ill at the peak of her career. Others believe that her “reincarnation” and transition to abstract paintings increased Drewelowe’s popularity as an artist by keeping her relevant in an evolving artistic world.
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2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau
