History lecture on lesser-known 20th-century female artists who stood on their own

Sep. 13—Susan Williamson will present "From the Shadow to the Spotlight," a new art history lecture focusing on 20th-century female artists, at 1 and 7 p.m. Sept. 20 at the Carroll Arts Center in Westminster. A reception with Williamson will immediately follow the matinee presentation with a second reception preceding the evening presentation at 6 p.m. Admission is free, and no tickets are required.

Williamson's lecture focuses on six female artists: Alice Neel, Ruth Asawa, Faith Ringgold, Ana Mendieta, Remedios Varo and Susan O'Malley. Most are familiar with prolific female artists like Georgia O'Keeffe and Frida Kahlo, as well as their male counterparts, Edgar Degas and Diego Rivera, but these six female artists come with no male counterpart. Through personal tragedy and sheer determination, they stood on their own.

Williamson received a masters in liberal arts from Western Maryland College (now McDaniel College) in 1996. She then had a variety of arts experiences — teaching high school art and humanities, owning her own pottery studio and traveling to the Netherlands to study 17th-century Dutch painting techniques. Eventually, Williamson became an adjunct lecturer in art history at McDaniel College and Carroll Community college, as well as the visual arts coordinator of the Carroll County Arts Council. She is also one of the founding members of Off Track Art, an artist co-op in downtown Westminster.

With this lecture, Williamson hopes to "pique the audience's interest to do some searching on their own to find more works by these amazing artists, [and] find more fascinating lives of other women artists who made it on their own."

Learn more at carrollcountyartscouncil.org or by calling 410-848-7272.