Sarah Iepson

This project undertakes research of primary source documents about and images produced by women in Glasgow and Philadelphia in order to address gaps in current scholarship. In particular, this study addresses the simultaneous rise and fall of women artists in these urban locations. Through travel to and research in archives and museums in the United Kingdom and United States, this endeavor seeks to reveal the loci of suppression and revitalize the careers of female artists sidelined by art history. Additionally, this exploration articulates the ways in which similar educational systems and political reform movements encouraged the empowerment of women in these “sister cities.” Due to these parallel circumstances, a transatlantic dialogue is constructed between female artists in Philadelphia and Glasgow from 1880-1920.

This project is designed to restore and fortify relationships between Bryn Mawr College and two institutions in Philadelphia that have been severely affected by the pandemic and that serve a wide socio-economic demographic: the Community College of Philadelphia and E. M. Stanton School (K-8) in South Philadelphia. We are creating a year of vibrant outreach programming including classes, talks, workshops, and informal mentoring, and will build to a collaborative production of a play inspired by and adapted from Medea, a tragedy by the ancient Greek playwright Euripides. The play has been reconceived to place at its center questions of race and familial conflict and their impact on Medea's children: this is “Greek theater through Black eyes.”