Women in the Nineteenth-Century Art World: Schools of Art and Design for Women in London and Philadelphia

A historical perspective on current issues, such as gender and class, is applied to art education and rendered through the study of two specific institutions, the Female School of Design in London and the Philadelphia School of Design for Women. Sweeping generalizations are avoided as women’s history, intertwined with men’s, unfolds in two cities on opposite continents. Women’s struggles against male domination and prejudice to define for themselves art education for work provides the common theme uniting the social issues explored. Through this unique examination of the relationship between the two schools, women’s place in British and American art education is reclaimed.

The specific focus on two art and design schools should appeal to social, education and art scholars and historians as well as to students and researchers interested in women’s and gender studies. The relationship between the two schools of art and design has never been fully explored. This new study of women’s art education, through the lens of these two schools, is particularly engaging and provoking in light of its male authorhip.