Evelyn Wilson (1915-2006) Witnesses 20st century Terracotta
Gift of the Ben and Evelyn Wilson Foundation Permanent Collection 2009: Object donated. Evelyn Wilson’s career was remarkable. The child of Hungarian immigrants, she grew up on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, studied languages (ultimately speaking six) at Hunter College, received an engineering degree from Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, and attended the Paris Academie Julien. In 1940, she married artist Ben Wilson. This diverse background led to a career in the cosmetics industry; she was the executive vice president of Faberge Perfumes, president of Faberge France, and a designer for Revlon. At the same time, she was a practicing artist—exhibiting her sculptures for nearly fifty years, and working in her studio until a year before her death. This sculpture, featuring four female figures surrounding a fifth female, may be part of the series Community of Women, which was Wilson’s major life’s work. She was drawn to this subject “because of the personal challenges she had faced as a woman artist and career woman, and because of her abiding admiration for the nurturing, compassionate nature of women.” Critics have noted the sense of serenity, mutual support, and tenderness evident in these sculptures, which were often fashioned in groups of figures. Joanne Jaffe, daughter of the artists and president of the Ben and Evelyn Wilson Foundation, donated hundreds of their works to colleges and universities, including Wheaton College. Following her mother’s death in 2006, Jaffe arranged for the gift of three sculptures to the Permanent Collection.
-Written by Zephorene L. Stickney, College Archivist & Special Collections Curator
Kate Kimball, Class of 2010
Liberation 2010 Ink, paper, stone, and watercolor Purchased by the Wheaton College Friends of Art Permanent Collection 2010: Book created Kimball, a member of the Class of 2010, created this piece for her Senior Seminar in Studio Art. Designed as a foldout pamphlet, the book was created with polyester plate lithography and watercolor. It represents the transformation Kimball experienced during her final year at Wheaton, illustrating many of the challenges students face as they consider life after graduation.
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