Contemporary Women Artists Files

Arranged alphabetically by name of artist, then chronologically by dates of materials.

Based on materials collected by the Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series since its beginning, the CWAF was established in 1994, not only to document the artists who submitted to the Series, but to provide evidence of the presence of women as artists since the 1970s despite their secondary status and low visibility in the art world. Series coordinators actively solicited materials such as resumes, artist statements, slides, and exhibition ephemera, to provide documentation of women artists who might otherwise remain undocumented. In addition, correspondence between the artists and the Series give a sense of the workings of Series staff during the selection process. Approximately 1500 artists are currently documented in the Files.

The most recent preferred professional name was determined for each artist in the collection, and this was used as the folder heading. The container list for this subgroup also includes any alternate names, the date range of materials in each folder, and information about juried artists for the 1987/1988 and 1988/1989 Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series exhibition seasons.