Sutter's Fort ruins painting by Amanda Austin

Amanda Petronella Austin (1859 – 1917) was an American painter and

sculptor Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

Biography

A native of Carrollton,

Missouri Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...

, Austin studied from 1877 to 1879 at the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus University of Missouri System. MU was founded in ...

, becoming a favored pupil of

George Caleb Bingham George Caleb Bingham (March 20, 1811 – July 7, 1879) was an American artist, soldier and politician known in his lifetime as "the Missouri Artist". Initially a Whig, he was elected as a delegate to the Missouri legislature before the American C ...

, to whom she gave two of her paintings. In 1879 she moved to

Sacramento ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...

, home of her great-uncle, Jefferson Wilcoxson; he was ill, and in return for her care he provided money for her to continue her training, which she did in the studio of

Norton Bush Norton Bush (February 22, 1834 – April 24, 1894) was an American landscape painter. He did landscape paintings of California, Panama, Nicaragua, Peru and Ecuador, with a focus on Luminism. Early life Norton Bush was born on February 22, 1834 ...

. Her first exposure came at the 1880

California State Fair The California State Fair is the annual state fair for the state of California. The fair is held at Cal Expo in Sacramento, California. The Fair is a 17-day event showcasing California's industries, agriculture, and diversity of people. The CSF ...

, where her drawings won praise from the critic of '' The Sacramento Bee''. The following year at the Fair, the showing of her ''Morning Glories'' brought her a measure of notoriety. In May 1882 she enrolled in the San Francisco School of Design; she continued to exhibit regularly in Sacramento at this point, and also at the

San Francisco Art Association The San Francisco Art Association (SFAA) was an organization that promoted California artists, held art exhibitions, published a periodical, and established the first art school west of Chicago. The SFAA – which, by 1961, completed a long sequence ...

, where she received a gold medal and an honorable mention. Later in 1885 she taught for a few months at the School of Design in Sacramento; on January 16, 1886, she opened her own studio in that town's Oddfellows building. Her painting class attracted many students. In 1908 Austin went to Paris, where she kept a studio until 1912 and studied with Jean Escoula and Emile Renard. Here she began to work at sculpture, and in 1909 a marble bust of ''Miss Quinn'' was accepted for show at the

Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts (SNBA; ; en, National Society of Fine Arts) was the term under which two groups of French artists united, the first for some exhibitions in the early 1860s, the second since 1890 for annual exhibitions. 1862 Es ...

. Its exhibition won her a place in the Union Internationale des Beaux-Artes et des Lettres. In 1912 she returned to Sacramento; ''Miss Quinn'', along with other works, was exhibited at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition. With another sculpture it then traveled to exhibits at the Buffalo Fine Arts Academy and the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1916, with a commission in hand from the city of Sacramento, Austin returned once more to Paris to execute a monument, only to be told by her doctor to return as she was dying of cancer. En route, she died in New York City, three days before turning fifty-eight. On her deathbed Austin married E. Lee Allen. She left all her property to him in her will, but her family contested it. The result was that her works were divided up and her legacy fell into obscurity. ''Morning Glories'', currently among her works in the collection of the

Crocker Art Museum The Crocker Art Museum is the oldest art museum in the Western United States, located in Sacramento, California. Founded in 1885, the museum holds one of the premier collections of Californian art. The collection includes American works dating f ...

, was included in the inaugural exhibition of the

National Museum of Women in the Arts The National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA), located in Washington, D.C., is "the first museum in the world solely dedicated" to championing women through the arts. NMWA was incorporated in 1981 by Wallace and Wilhelmina Holladay. Since openin ...

, ''American Women Artists 1830–1930'', in 1987.

References

1859 births 1917 deaths American women painters American women sculptors 19th-century American painters 19th-century American women artists 20th-century American painters 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American women artists People from Carrollton, Missouri Artists from Sacramento, California Painters from Missouri Painters from California Sculptors from California Deaths from cancer in New York (state) San Francisco Art Institute alumni Sculptors from Missouri University of Missouri alumni {{US-painter-1850s-stub