24 Facts About Edith Kramer

Edith Kramer was an Austrian social realist painter, a follower of psychoanalytic theory and an art therapy pioneer.

At age 13 Kramer began art lessons with Friedl Dicker.

Edith Kramer studied drawing, sculpture and painting, and was influenced by the method for teaching art developed by Bauhaus artist Johannes Itten.

Edith Kramer stayed after her shift to draw the other workers in their industrial setting.

In 1947 Edith Kramer visited some of the earliest known artwork, in the caves at Lascaux.

Edith Kramer spoke of these cave paintings as an example of the universal language of art.

Still in her 33rd year, Edith Kramer was offered a job at Wiltwyck School for Boys, a school and residential treatment facility for children with behavioral and emotional needs.

Edith Kramer's training was in art, art education and psychoanalytically informed psychotherapy.

Edith Kramer believed sublimation to be one of the most vital goals of art therapy.

Edith Kramer asserted that the success of the therapy could be measured by the visual product.

In 1958 Edith Kramer published Art Therapy in a Children's Community, based on her time working with the students at the Wiltwyck School.

Edith Kramer worked at Jacobi Hospital in their child psychiatric ward for 13 years.

Edith Kramer wrote in her books of her experiences with her clients.

Edith Kramer worked for 14 years at the Jewish Guild for the Blind.

Edith Kramer felt denying the client the gratification of the end product was robbing them.

Edith Kramer believed that Art Therapy should fall more in the humanities area than psychology.

Edith Kramer asserted that art therapy was not a replacement, but a supplement to psychotherapy.

When in active practice, Edith Kramer maintained a studio where she painted, etched, and sculpted.

Edith Kramer believed that art should be personal and reflective of the artist's environment.

Edith Kramer often depicted physical, tangible objects such as herself, other people, landscapes, and cityscapes.

Edith Kramer received an honorary doctorate in 1996 from Norwich University in Northfield, Vermont.

Edith Kramer helped develop one of the country's earliest art therapy graduate degree programs at New York University.

In 2014, Edith Kramer was posthumously awarded the inaugural Myra Levick Award for Excellence in Art Therapy.

Edith Kramer was a niece of Theodor Kramer and Elisabeth Neumann-Viertel.