A long-overdue reexamination of beloved American artist Grandma Moses, restoring her rightful place within the canon of mid-century American Art. One of the best-known artists of her time, and a true American legend, Anna Mary Robertson "Grandma" Moses (1860–1961) was often marginalized as a latter-day "folk" painter or a phenomenon of popular media. Accompanying a traveling exhibition, this new book looks closely at the paintings themselves and the artist’s compelling biography to reassert her role in the development of a culture of modernist art at mid-century. Presenting fresh research, several scholars examine Moses’s name, public persona, painted world, and wildly popular place in American pop culture; address the myth of the self-taught artist; and contextualize her work alongside such contemporaries as Horace Pippin, Elie Nadelman, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, and Morris Hirshfield.

About the Authors:

Thomas Denenberg is the director of the Shelburne Museum.

Robert Wolterstorff is the director and Jamie Franklin is curator at the Bennington Museum.

Diana Korzenik is professor emerita at the Massachusetts College of Art.

Alexander Nemerov is professor of art history at Stanford University.