28 Facts About Isabel Bishop

Isabel Bishop was an American painter and graphic artist.

Isabel Bishop was most notable for her scenes of everyday life in Manhattan, as a member of the loosely-defined 'Fourteenth Street School' of artists, grouped in that precinct.

Isabel Bishop's paintings won the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, among other distinctions.

Isabel Bishop was born the youngest of five siblings in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Isabel Bishop compared growing up and moving around with her parents to be like being an only child, because her siblings were fifteen plus years older than her and didn't live with her family at the time.

Isabel Bishop's father was a scholar of Greek and Latin.

In 1918, at the age of 15, Isabel Bishop graduated high school and began art studies at John Wicker's art school in Detroit, Michigan.

Isabel Bishop later moved to New York City to study illustration at the New York School of Applied Design for Women.

Isabel Bishop was described as an eager intellectual who was naturally inquisitive and independent in her ways.

Isabel Bishop pushed against this attitude toward women artists with her insistence on applying herself both academically and politically in the art realm.

Isabel Bishop's work was greatly influenced by Peter Paul Rubens and other Dutch and Flemish painters that she had discovered during trips to Europe.

In 1932, Isabel Bishop began showing her work frequently at the newly opened Midtown Galleries, where her work would be represented throughout her career.

Isabel Bishop takes inspiration from Rubens by adding a light ochre-ish tone to all her works, allowing for the painting to be rendered in any way.

In 1934, Bishop married Dr Harold G Wolff, a neurologist, and moved to Riverdale New York.

Isabel Bishop became interested in the interaction of form and ground and the mobility of everyday life, what she called "unfixity", life and movement captured on canvas.

Isabel Bishop's style is noted for its sensitive modeling of form and "a submarine pearliness and density of atmosphere".

Isabel Bishop's work was included in the first three iterations of the Whitney Biennial in 1932,1934, and 1936, as well as ten subsequent annual exhibitions at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Isabel Bishop returned to the Art Students League as an instructor from 1936 to 1937.

In 1940, Isabel Bishop was elected into the National Academy of Design as an associate member, and became a full member in 1941.

Isabel Bishop's work was part of the painting event in the art competition at the 1932 Summer Olympics.

Isabel Bishop was a member of and frequently shown her work in the Society of American Graphic Artists exhibitions.

Isabel Bishop included a Revolutionary soldier, a governor of Wisconsin, a founder of New Lexington and his grandson, an author of reference books on Ohio, the developer of the coal industry, a senator, a newspaperman, a naturalist, the county's first historian, and General Sheridan.

Isabel Bishop painted multiple-figure compositions, often containing two females engaged in various workday interactions.

Isabel Bishop's work remains significant as an example of the thematic concerns of the Fourteenth St School, as well as her contribution to feminism and the "new woman" emerging in urban landscapes.

In 1946 Isabel Bishop became an officer of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, she was the first woman to hold this position.

The first retrospective exhibition of Isabel Bishop's work was held during her lifetime at the University of Arizona Museum of Art in 1974.

In 1943, Isabel Bishop was awarded the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award.

In Encounter, Isabel Bishop continues with her multiple-figure compositions capturing a scene of interaction between a man and a woman on a city street.