Women in the 19C United States of America: Still Another American Decorative Impressionist Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943)

Thursday, September 22, 2022

Still Another American Decorative Impressionist Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943)

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943), American Impressionist painter, studied at the St. Louis School of Fine Arts, & then sailed for Paris to study at Academie Julian (1898–1901). Paris was the art capital of the 19th-century. Its museums, exhibition spaces, art academies, & the manner in which the arts were perceived as an integral part of everyday life drew painters, sculptors, & architects from around the world to the French capital. As the painter Cecilia Beaux expressed it, "Everything is there." Miller became part of the “Giverny Group,” the 2nd generation of mostly American artists to study & paint near the gardens created at his home by Claude Monet. Here are a few of Miller's women in gardens.

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) In the Garden

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Reading in the Garden

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Summer Reverie

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Sylvan Dell or Reverie

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) The Garden Seat

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Woman Reading in the Garden

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Young Woman Sewing (in the Garden)

Richard Emil Miller (1875-1943) Woman with Parasol

Richard Edward or Emil Miller (1875-1943)
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About this blog

In colonial America, men were considered superior to woman in all ways. In a strict patriarchal hierarchy, men controlled not only wealth & political power but also how their children were raised, religious questions, & all matters of right & wrong.

In the early part of the 19Cy, however, many Americans experienced a revolution in gender. The doctrine of “separate spheres” maintained that woman’s sphere was the world of privacy, family, & morality while man’s sphere was the public world -– economic striving, political maneuvering, & social competition. But women were interested in equality.

In 1848, New York passed the Married Woman’s Property Act. Now a woman wasn’t automatically liable for her husband’s debts; she could enter contracts on her own; she could collect rents or receive an inheritance in her own right; she could file a lawsuit on her own behalf. She became for economic purposes, an individual. By 1900, every state has passed legislation modeled after this, granting married women some control over their property and earnings.

In 1870 after the Civi War, the 15th Amendment was ratified, saying, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” African-Americans could vote, but women could not.

But it was not until 1920, that the 19th Amendment was ratified granting women the right to vote. “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”