DCC Exhibits Works of Renowned Sculptor for Women’s History Month

Release Date January 12, 2007

Dutchess Community College presents the work of a renowned sculptor in Concetta Scarvalione, 1900-1975 at the Mildred I. Washington Art Gallery on Monday, February 26 through Friday, March 23. The College will hold a Women’s History Month reception on this groundbreaking artist on Thursday, March 1 from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. The show’s co-curators are Carol Kushner, Assistant Professor of English at DCC and the artist’s great-niece, and Gallery Director Lynn Palumbo. For information, contact Gallery Director Lynn Palumbo at (845) 431-8000 ext. 3982, email palumbo@sunydutchess.edu or visit www.sunydutchess.edu/pvac/WashingtonArtGallery.htm

Scaravaglione once wrote, “If, in an ordered work of sculpture, I can convey something of my unconscious conception of beauty, and my absorbed enjoyment in the work, if the stone or the clay or the wood is not too obstinate, if it seems to be on friendly terms with me, then I am profoundly happy.”

The youngest child of Italian immigrant parents, she broke family and cultural boundaries as she embarked on an arts education in her teens and eventually led the bohemian artist’s life in the 1920s. By 1928, the value of her work was increasingly acknowledged. Juliana Force, director of the Whitney Studio – later to become the Whitney Museum – expressed her interest in Scaravaglione’s work. Scaravaglione was invited to exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum and at the Museum of Modern Art.

In 1934, Scaravaglione’s “Mother and Child” was exhibited at the Mayor LaGuardia-sponsored First Municipal Art Exhibition in Rockefeller Center. Scaravaglione and Director of Exhibitions Holger Cahill, who would become National Director of the Federal Art Project, and began a long association, and Scaravaglione’s “Girl with Gazelle” was exhibited in the 1938 Federal Art Project Outdoor Sculpture show. That work was also featured on the covers of both the May 1, 1938 issue of Art Digest and the April 25, 1938 issue of Newsweek. In addition, Scaravaglione was one of 12 sculptors chosen to receive a commission from the Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture, and completed four works under this program – a limestone relief on the Federal Trade Commission building, a large plaster figure for the 1939 World’s Fair, an aluminum figure of a railway mail carrier for the Post Office Department building, and a wood relief for the Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania Post Office.

Exhibitions in the late 1930s and early 40s included the Art Institute of Chicago, the Corcoran Gallery, the Whitney Museum, the Jeu de Paume in Paris, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a one-woman exhibition at the Virgina Museum of Fine Arts in 1941. Her 1947 award of the Prix de Rome broke the all-male record of this particular grant from the American Academy and gave her the opportunity to live and work in Italy with a stipend of $1,250 a year, transportation to and from Rome, studio space, residence at the Academy, and an additional travel allowance.

Scaravaglione returned to the United States in the early 1950s and began teaching at Vassar College in 1952, having taught previously at New York University, Black Mountain College, and Sarah Lawrence College. Despite health problems, she continued to sculpt and exhibit. A six-foot tall welded copper figure “Woman Walking” was exhibited at the 1964 World’s Fair, and a large copper “Self Portrait” was shown at her 1967 one-woman show at the Vassar Art Gallery. In 1972, her first New York one-woman show was held at the Kraushaar Galleries on Fifth Avenue. Scaravaglione died in 1975 after a long bout with cancer.

The Mildred I. Washington Art Gallery is located at the north end of campus in the Allyn J. Washington Center for Science and Art, room 150-153. Gallery hours are Monday through Thursday, 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., and Friday 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

The Concetta Scaravaglione exhibit at DCC follows the Fall 2006 PVAC Student Exhibit, which runs Tuesday, January 16 through Friday, February 9 with an Artists’ reception on Thursday, January 18 from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. Additional shows this semester include In Plain Sight, which runs Monday, April 9 through Friday, May 4, with an artists’ reception on Thursday, April 12 from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m.; and the Spring 2007 PVAC Student Exhibit, which opens on Graduation Day, Thursday, May 17, and runs through Friday, June 22.

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