A prolific painter and printmaker, Bishop depicted scenes of everyday life and people in New York as a member of the so-called Fourteenth Street School, a loosely affiliated group of artists concentrated around Union Square. Young working women figure prominently in her art, as in this close-up view of two smartly dressed figures seemingly engaged over a piece of correspondence. Owing partly to her earlier study at the Art Students League, Bishop frequently worked from models. The models for Two Girls were Rose Riggens, a server at a restaurant where Bishop often had breakfast, and Riggenss friend Anna Abbott. The composition’s serenity and warm glow rather belies the grim economic circumstances of the Great Depression in the 1930s.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Two Girls
Artist:Isabel Bishop (American, Cincinnati, Ohio 1902–1988 Riverdale, New York)
Date:1935
Medium:Oil and tempera on paperboard
Dimensions:20 in. × 24 1/16 in. × 1 in. (50.8 × 61.1 × 2.5 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Arthur Hoppock Hearn Fund, 1936
Object Number:36.27
Inscription: Signed (lower left): Isabel Bishop
the artist, New York (1935–36; sold through the Midtown Galleries, New York to MMA)
Southampton, N.Y. Four Fountains. "Midtown Galleries group exhibition," July 30–August 1935, no catalogue.
New York. Midtown Galleries. "Group exhibition," closed October 22, 1935, no catalogue.
New York. Midtown Galleries. "Isabel Bishop," February 11–29, 1936, no. 6.
Paris. United States Pavilion. "Exposition internationale des arts et des techniques dans la vie moderne," May 25–November 25, 1937, unnumbered cat. (p. 672).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Contemporary Painting in the United States," April 19–27, 1941, no. 14.
Mexico City. Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes. "La Pintura Contemporánea Norteamericana," June 12–July 9, 1941, unnumbered cat. (p. 26).
Santiago. Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes. "La Pintura Contemporánea Norteamericana," September 6–October 5, 1941, unnumbered cat.
Lima. Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes. "La Pintura Contemporánea Norteamericana," November 5–30, 1941, unnumbered cat.
Quito. Universidad Central de Ecuador. "La Pintura Contemporánea Norteamericana," December 1941, unnumbered cat.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "20th Century Painters: A Special Exhibition of Oils, Water Colors and Drawings Selected from the Collections of American Art in the Metropolitan Museum," June 16–October 29, 1950, unnum. brochure (p. 3).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Columbia Bicentennial Exhibition," October 28, 1954–April 18, 1955, no catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Three Centuries of American Painting," April 9–October 17, 1965, unnum. checklist.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Paintings, Drawings and Watercolors from the Museum's Collections," October 1–December 7, 1969, no catalogue.
Trenton. New Jersey State Museum. "Paintings by Isabel Bishop; Sculpture by Dorothea Greenbaum," May 2–July 5, 1970, no. 3.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Isabel Bishop," April 11–June 1, 1975, no catalogue.
Yonkers. Hudson River Museum. "Women in America: The Second Hundred Years 1876–1976," September 14–November 16, 1975, not in brochure.
Bellingham, Wash. Whatcom Museum of History and Art. "5000 Years of Art: An Exhibition from the Collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art," December 4, 1976–October 2, 1977, no. 79.
Jacksonville, Fla. Jacksonville Art Museum. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 9–April 21, 1985, unnumbered cat. (p. 85).
Oklahoma City. Oklahoma Museum of Art. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," May 5–June 30, 1985, unnumbered cat.
New York. National Academy of Design. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," July 16–September 1, 1985, unnumbered cat.
Evanston, Ill. Terra Museum of American Art. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," September 15–November 10, 1985, unnumbered cat.
Little Rock. Arkansas Arts Center. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," November 12, 1985–January 19, 1986, unnumbered cat.
Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 9–March 30, 1986, unnumbered cat.
St. Paul. Minnesota Museum of Art. "The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art," April 20–June 8, 1986, unnumbered cat.
Howard Devree. "Early Fall Shows in the Galleries." New York Times (October 6, 1935), p. X9.
"Art at Southampton." New York Herald Tribune (August 4, 1935), p. D4.
"On the Local Horizons." New York Times (June 21, 1936), p. X7.
James W. Lane. "Current Exhibitions." Parnassus 8 (March 1936), p. 23, ill.
"Museum Buys Bishop Canvas." New York Times (February 20, 1936), p. 2.
Edward Alden Jewell. "Hither and Yon with the Spotlight." New York Times (February 16, 1936), p. X10, ill.
"Art Brevities." New York Times (February 20, 1936), p. 22.
Royal Cortissoz. "Alexandre Iacovleff, Russian Draughtsman; Isabel Bishop and Some Others." New York Herald Tribune (February 16, 1936), p. E10.
"American Painting Bought by the Metropolitan." New York Herald Tribune (February 20, 1936), p. 15, ill.
William Engle. "Portrait of 'Two Girls' Bought by Metropolitan, Reunites Two Ex-Waitresses Who Posed for It." New York World Telegram (February 27, 1936), p. 3, ill., identifies the sitters as Rose Riggens (later Mrs. Rose Hirschberg) and Anne Abbott (later Mrs. Anne Sweeters), who both worked at Childs' restaurant on 14th Street and Broadway, where Bishop encountered Riggens and asked her to pose in her studio; quotes the artist's recollection: "I wanted to paint her as she was, somehow, and give the feeling that it didn't matter about the outside appearance the looking glass shows. I wanted to do her as a person... When she came she brought along another girl".
Marshall Davidson. "Notes." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 31 (April 1936), p. 91, notes that this work is currently on view in the Room of Recent Accessions.
"Accessions." American Magazine of Art 29 (April 1936), p. 247, ill. p. 245.
"An Honored Few." New York Herald Tribune (June 21, 1936), p. E8.
Art Students League of New York. Isabel Bishop. Instructor: Life Painting, Composition. New York, [1936], ill. n.p.
"Museum Purchase of Painting Reunites Waitress Models." Burlington Daily News (March 3, 1936), p. 10, ill., publishes a photograph of the sitters recreating their poses in this painting.
J[oseph]. D[owns]. in "Notes: At the Paris Exposition." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 32 (August 1937), p. 199.
Carlyle Burrows. "A Landmark Reached by the Independents. Art for Latin America." New York Herald Tribune (April 20, 1941), p. E8.
Robert Beverly Hale. 100 American Painters of the 20th Century: Works Selected from the Collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1950, ill. p. 62.
Henry Geldzahler. American Painting in the Twentieth Century. New York, 1965, pp. 107–8, ill.
Doris Reno. "Miami's Old 17th Century Friend Found Shining in a New Setting." Miami Herald (August 22, 1965), p. 21E.
Sheldon Reich inIsabel Bishop. Exh. cat., University of Arizona Museum of Art. Tucson, 1974, p. 23.
Grace Glueck. "New Honors for Painter on Union Sq." New York Times (April 11, 1975), p. 18.
Lawrence Alloway. "Isabel Bishop, the Grand Manner and the Working Girl." Art in America 63 (September–October 1975), p. 63, ill. p. 65 (color).
Karl Lunde. Isabel Bishop. New York, 1975, pp. 28–29, 48, 77 n. 8, colorpl. 14.
Thomas Schlotterback. 5000 Years of Art: An Exhibition from the Collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exh. cat., Whatcom Museum of History and Art. Bellingham, Wash., 1976, pp. 14, 108–9, no. 79, ill.
Robert Henkes. Eight American Women Painters. New York, 1977, p. 29, ill. no. 34 (between pp. 30 and 31).
Charlotte Streifer Rubinstein. American Women Artists from Early Indian Times to the Present. Boston, 1982, p. 229, ill. front cover (color detail).
Helen Yglesias. "Isabel Bishop: Paintings, Drawings, Prints. An Appreciation." Massachusetts Review 24 (Summer 1983), pp. 291–92, ill. p. 299.
Lowery Stokes Sims. The Figure in 20th Century American Art: Selections from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exh. cat., Jacksonville Art Museum. New York, 1984, pp. 10, 71, 80, 84–85, ill. (color).
Helen Yglesias. Isabel Bishop. New York, 1989, pp. 17, 20, ill. (color) front cover and p. 72.
Donald Goddard. American Painting. New York, 1990, ill. p. 228 (color).
Mary Sweeney Ellett. "Isabel Bishop: The Seamless Web." Arts in Virginia 30, no. 1 (1991), p. 26, fig. 1, spells the name of the sitter at right as Rose Riggins [see Ref. Engle 1936].
Ellen Wiley Todd. The "New Woman" Revised: Painting and Gender Politics on Fourteenth Street. Berkeley, 1993, pp. 273, 294–95, 314, fig. 7.1, spells the name of the sitter at right as Rose Riggins [see Ref. Engle 1936].
Anne E. Dawson. "The Renoir Acquired in 1945 by the Rhode Island School of Design Museum: A Significant Choice." Gazette des Beaux-Arts 140 (April 1998), p. 186, fig. 6.
Helen Langa. "Review. Recent Feminist Art History: An American Sampler." Feminist Studies 30 (Fall 2004), pp. 725–26, fig. 3.
Isabel Bishop (American, Cincinnati, Ohio 1902–1988 Riverdale, New York)
1969 / 1981
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