L ong before her monumental

black sculptures and iconic mink

eyelashes, famed artist Louise
Nevelson (1899-1988) was just a small
immigrant girl growing up in Rockland,
Maine.
Born Leah Berliawsky in Ukraine in
1899, Nevelson arrived in the United
States with her family in 1905. The
Jewish family struggled upon their
arrival, both financially and as a religious
minority. Still, Nevelson discovered her
talent for art and set her sights on a bold,
unconventional life.
An exhibition currently on view
at the Farnsworth Art Museum charts
young artist’s journey to becoming a
major American artist. Louise Nevelson:
Dawn to Dusk features more than 40
works, including Nevelson’s early
paintings, drawings and figurative
sculptures, as well as later abstract
painted wood constructions, collages and
handcrafted jewelry. The exhibition runs
through December 2024.
The show was curated by Suzette
McAvoy, the Farnsworth’s former
director and now independent curator
and arts writer. All works exhibited
are part of the Farnsworth’s collection,
which is the second-largest holding
of Nevelson’s work after the Whitney
Museum of American Art.
McAvoy says the Farnsworth is
uniquely poised to illuminate Nevelson’s
artistic development. “Our collection
is strong in Nevelson’s student work Louise Nevelson (1899-1988), Female Nude, ca. 1928. Oil on canvas, 30 x 22½ in.
and formative paintings and sculptures,” Gift of Louise Nevelson, 1981.2.1.
McAvoy says.
Nevelson knew from an early age took inspiration from him to find her generative for Nevelson. She held aside
that she wanted to pursue a career as own voice. some of the foraged scrap wood and
an artist. Despite recognition from her Nevelson had a son in 1922 and, began to build assemblages with it.
school teachers, she knew she would like many female artists throughout Nevelson’s first New York show was
need to go further afield to pursue her history, she was torn between the duties in 1941. It took more than a decade
dream. At age 20 she found a way out of motherhood and the pursuit of her before her reputation was sealed as
of Rockland. She married businessman artistic passion. In 1931 she chose a an important artist. Her 1958 black,
Charles Nevelson and moved to New taboo path and left her son, Mike, in wooden wall piece, Moon Gardens +
York City. She began taking classes at the the care of family so she could live One, prompted the chief curator at the
Art Students League of New York. Her in Europe and study with renowned Museum of Modern Art to include
painting from this period, Female Nude, painter Hans Hofman. She separated her work in the 1959 Sixteen Americans
shows Nevelson’s early engagement from her husband at this time. When she show at MoMA, for which Nevelson
with the fundamentals of oil painting. returned to New York, she and Mike created her famous work Dawn’s
She studied with Kenneth Hayes Miller, were forced to live in poverty, sometimes Wedding Feast.
a well-known and respected artist and scrounging firewood from the streets to The Farnsworth exhibit includes
teacher. Though Nevelson ultimately burn in their fireplace to keep warm. Dawn Column I, a segment from the
abandoned Miller’s traditional style, she But even those struggles proved room-size installation Dawn’s Wedding

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