Mary Edmonia Lewis, neoclassical sculptor

Mary Edmonia Lewis (1844-1907), the first internationally famous African-American and Native American female sculptor, was known for portraying black and indigenous people in her neoclassical work. Born to free parents in Greenbush, NY, Lewis was orphaned at the age of 9 and raised by aunts from the Mississauga Ojibwe tribe.

In 1859, she entered Oberlin College in Ohio, the first co-educational school to accept students of color. Her college years were marred by prejudice and false charges, including accusations of poisoning two classmates with aphrodisiacs. After being badly beaten by unknown assailants, she was arrested and charged with attempted poisoning. In 1862, the only practicing African-American attorney in Oberlin defended her at trial and she was acquitted. A year later, she was accused of stealing art supplies and prohibited from finishing her last term.

In 1864, she moved to Boston to begin her career as a sculptor, relying on the art community and abolitionists to help get her get started. She studied with local sculptors and created carvings of Union Civil War heroes, including John Brown and Col. Robert Gould Shaw, commander of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the first African-American unit. The bust of Shaw became her most famous work to date, and with the addition of sculptures based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s epic poem, The Song of Hiawatha, she was able to raise enough money to move to Rome. In this ancient city, Lewis bucked tradition and did her own marble carving, rather than relying on craftsmen to copy her clay or wax models. Her work sold extremely well, making her studio a destination for tourists and garnering her invitations to major exhibitions around the world. One of her most important works, The Death of Cleopatra, was exhibited at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. Her depiction of a sensuous, disheveled queen in her death throes drew criticism, but also huge crowds. In 1877, former President Ulysses S. Grant commissioned her to carve his portrait.

Toward the end of her life, as neoclassicism waned in popularity, she sculpted marble altarpieces for Roman Catholic patrons.