Lenore Tawney facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Lenore Tawney
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Lenore Tawney, 1959
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| Born |
Leonora Agnes Gallagher
May 10, 1907 Lorain, Ohio
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| Died | September 24, 2007 (aged 100) New York, New York
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| Nationality | American |
| Education | Art Institute of Chicago, University of Illinois |
| Known for | drawing, sculpture, fiber art |
| Movement | Minimalism |
| Spouse(s) |
George Tawney
(m. 1941; died in 1943) |
Lenore Tawney (born Leonora Agnes Gallagher; May 10, 1907 – September 24, 2007) was an American artist. She was famous for her drawings, collages, and sculptures. Lenore Tawney became a very important person in the world of fiber art, which uses threads and fabrics to create art.
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Early Life and Artistic Training
Lenore Tawney was one of five children. She was born in Lorain, Ohio, to Irish American parents. When she was 20, she moved to Chicago. There, she worked as a proofreader and took art classes at night. She studied at the Art Institute of Chicago.
In 1941, she married George Tawney, but he passed away just 18 months later. After this, she moved to Urbana, Illinois. She enrolled at the University of Illinois to study art therapy. In 1946, Lenore learned about the Bauhaus school from Germany. This school had new ideas about art and design. She also studied with famous artists like Alexander Archipenko, a Cubist sculptor. She also learned from abstract expressionist painter Emerson Woelffer. In 1949, she studied weaving with Marli Ehrman.
From 1949 to 1951, Lenore lived in Paris. She traveled a lot around North Africa and Europe. In 1954, she studied with Martta Taipale, a well-known Finnish weaver. This is when she started working with tapestries. She also began using new colors in her art.
Artistic Career and Style
In 1957, Lenore Tawney moved to New York City. Here, she became friends with artists who were part of the Minimalism movement. These artists included Ellsworth Kelly and Agnes Martin.
In 1961, Lenore had her first solo art show. It featured 40 weavings she had made since 1955. This show was at the Staten Island Museum. That same year, she invented a special "open reed" for her loom. This allowed her to create more flexible and unique woven shapes.
Throughout the 1960s, Lenore made drawings and collages using postcards. She also created art that combined collage and woven pieces. After 1977, she started making huge "clouds" of art. These were made from thousands of shiny linen threads hanging from canvas supports. Lenore lived and worked mostly in New York City until she passed away in 2007. She often traveled around the world for inspiration. When she turned 100, she joked that "The first hundred years were the hardest."
Lenore Tawney was very well-known in the art world. She had over two dozen solo exhibitions in major galleries and museums. Her art is displayed in many public collections. These include the Art Institute of Chicago and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Books like Lenore Tawney: A Retrospective and Lenore Tawney: Signs on the Wind, Postcard Collages have been published about her work.
Different Types of Artwork
Lenore Tawney explored many different ways to make art. She didn't just stick to one style.
Fiber Art Creations
Lenore Tawney started weaving in 1954. Her early tapestries mixed old and new techniques. She used an ancient Peruvian weaving method called gauze weave. She also added colorful yarns to make her art look like paintings floating in space.
Because her weaving methods were so unusual, some people in the art world didn't understand her work at first. However, her unique style gained many loyal fans. Lenore is seen as a pioneer. She helped show that traditional crafts like weaving could be considered fine art. Before her, these two art worlds were often kept separate.
Lenore's weavings fit into three main types. These include solid straight weaves, open warp weaves, and mesh weaves. She often added needlework to her woven designs. This made the lines in her art more active. She also started making "woven forms." These were like tall sculptures made of weaving. They hung from the ceiling instead of on a wall. Sometimes, she added natural objects like feathers and shells to these pieces.
Unique Drawings
In 1964, Lenore Tawney began a series of drawings. She used ink on graphing paper. This collection of eight pieces later inspired her 1990s series called Drawings in Air. This new series was a 3D study of lines, like threads in space. Lenore would hang threads in the air using plexiglass and wood frames.
Creative Collages
Around the same time she started her drawings, Lenore also began making collages. She used old book pages, envelopes, and postcards as her canvas. On these, she added images, text, and drawings. These collages often held different kinds of messages. Some were secret, while others were funny. She sent many collages to her friends. She also created a series of collage books.
Assemblage Art
In 1964, Tawney started making assemblages. These were mixed-media artworks made from small found objects. She used things like feathers, twigs, pebbles, string, bones, and pages from old books. These delicate and poetic pieces often had a spiritual feeling. They shared quiet messages about finding inner peace and how fragile life can be. She continued to collect and put together these pieces until she passed away in 2007, at 100 years old. Her assemblage called Crow Woman from 1993 is a great example of her gentle, spiritual approach to art. It is now in the collection of the Honolulu Museum of Art.
Exhibitions of Her Work
Lenore Tawney's art has been shown in many places around the world.
Solo Exhibitions
- Lenore Tawney, 1961, Staten Island Museum, New York.
- Lenore Tawney, 1975, California State University, Fullerton.
- Lenore Tawney: A Personal World, 1978, Brookfield Craft Center, Connecticut.
- Lenore Tawney, 1979, New Jersey State Museum, Trenton.
- Lenore Tawney: A Retrospective, 1990, American Craft Museum, New York.
- Lenore Tawney, 1996, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Netherlands.
- Lenore Tawney–Meditations: Assemblages, Collages, and Weavings, 1997, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York.
- Vestures of Water: The Work of Lenore Tawney, 1997, Allentown Art Museum, Pennsylvania.
- Lenore Tawney: Celebrating Five Decades of Work, 2000, browngrotta arts, Wilton, Connecticut.
- Lenore Tawney: Drawings in Air, 2007, browngrotta arts, Wilton, Connecticut.
- Lenore Tawney: Wholly Unlooked For, 2013, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland.
- Lenore Tawney: Mirror of the Universe, 2019, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, Wisconsin.
Group Exhibitions
Lenore Tawney also took part in many group shows with other artists.
- Woven Forms, 1963, Museum of Contemporary Crafts, New York.
- Wall Hangings, 1969, The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
- Fiberworks, 1977, Cleveland Museum of Art.
- Weich und Plastich: Soft-Art, 1979, Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland.
- Craft Today: Poetry of the Physical, 1986, American Craft Council, New York.
- Fiber R/Evolution, 1986, Milwaukee Art Museum.
- The Eloquent Object, 1987, Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, Oklahoma.
- Abstraction: The Amerindian Paradigm, 2001, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels.
- Generations/Transformations: American Fiber Art, 2003, American Textile History Museum.
- Circa 1958: Breaking Ground in American Art, 2008, Ackland Art Museum.
- Messages & Magic, 100 Years of Collage and Assemblage in American Art, 2008, John Michael Kohler Arts Center.
- Fiber: Sculpture 1960–Present, 2014, Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston.
See also
