Mary Beth Edelson

Mary Beth Edelson was an American artist and pioneer of the feminist art movement, deemed one of the notable "first-generation feminist artists." Edelson was a printmaker, book artist, collage artist, painter, photographer, performance artist, and author. Her works have been shown at the Museum of Modern Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.
She began her studies at the Art Institute of Chicago and continued as she pursued her Bachelor's and Master of Fine Arts degrees. She taught art at the college level, including School of Art and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. and at the Corcoran Gallery of Art's Dupont Center for Advanced Studies.
Inspired by Henri Matisse, Paul Cézanne and Édouard Manet, she made paintings of mothers and children in the 1960s. During that decade, she owned a gallery in Indianapolis. Her art changed markedly in the 1970s when she shifted to performance and other forms of art, as well as how women are depicted in art. Her studies of philosophy and psychology greatly influenced her art, both in terms of content and medium.