Archives of American Art

Oral history interview with Eleanor Dickinson

Summary

Collection ID:
AAA.dickin00
Creators:
Dickinson, Eleanor, 1931-
Karlstrom, Paul J.
Dates:
2000 October 25
Languages:
English
.
Physical Description:
22 Pages
Transcript
Repository:

Scope and Contents

Scope and Contents
An interview of Eleanor Dickinson conducted 2000 October 25, by Paul Karlstrom, for the Archives of American Art, in Dickinson's studio/home, in San Francisco, California.
Scope and Contents
Dickinson discusses her relationship to and use of the human figure in her art. She explains her "interest in the ecstatic"; her identification with her subjects; being completely involved with the personality of the model and the "performance" in the studio; how her finished works often look more like the artist than like the model; her 1975 show at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in which the life-class was moved into a museum gallery to share the experience with museum visitors; her view that the artist participates in the lives and actions of her subjects through empathy and the artist's role as a mirror to society, reflecting and recording who and what we are.

Biographical / Historical

Biographical / Historical
Eleanor Dickinson (1931-2017 ) was a painter, graphic, video artist and instructor in San Francisco, Calif. Teacher of life drawing at the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, for many years, Dickinson was known for her figurative drawing and involvement with her students and models as individuals.

Administration

Sponsor
Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.
Existence and Location of Copies
Transcript available on line.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.

Digital Content


Using the Collection

Conditions Governing Access
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.

More Information

General

General
Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 48 min.


Keywords

Keywords table of terms and types.
Keyword Terms Keyword Types
Painters -- California -- San Francisco Occupation Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Graphic artists -- California -- San Francisco Occupation Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Video artists -- California -- San Francisco Occupation Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Educators -- California -- San Francisco Occupation Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Women artists Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Women painters Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Women educators Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Interviews Genre Form Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Sound recordings Genre Form Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid

Archives of American Art
750 9th Street, NW
Victor Building, Suite 2200
Washington, D.C. 20001
https://www.aaa.si.edu/services/questions