The art world lost two influential citizens on April 2, contemporaries only six months apart in age who each lived nearly a century. Both had close ties to the University of Iowa: one was a 1940 graduate, the other a member of the faculty for more than 60 years.

Elizabeth Catlett was a pioneer. In 1940, at age 25, she was among the first three students at the State University of Iowa—and in the nation—to receive the Master of Fine Arts degree. The M.F.A. was an Iowa innovation, a result of the Graduate College’s decision several years earlier to accept creative work in lieu of written theses for advanced degrees in the fine and performing arts. Ms. Catlett was also the first African-American woman in the U.S. to earn this distinction.

Her sculpture, Negro Mother and Child (1939), was accepted as her qualifying creative work for the M.F.A. and later won first prize in sculpture at the American Negro Exposition in Chicago. After completing her degree at Iowa, she taught at Dillard University in New Orleans, a historically black institution. In 1946 she was awarded a fellowship to travel to Mexico, where she remained for the rest of her life. Following work at a Mexico City workshop specializing in murals and graphic arts, she was appointed the first female professor of sculpture and head of the sculpture department at the National Autonomous University there.

Her sculptures convey a “deeply human image of African-Americans while appealing to values and virtues that encourage a sense of common humanity,” according to critic Michael Brenson. A complete obituary of Ms. Catlett appeared in the New York Times on April 3:
www.nytimes.com/2012/04/04/arts/design/elizabeth-catlett-sculptor-with-eye-on-social-issues-dies-at-96.html

Mauricio Lasansky joined the SUI faculty in the School of Art and Art History in 1945, at age 30. A native Argentinian from Buenos Aires, Mr. Lasansky studied at the Superior School of Fine Arts there and in 1936 was named director of a fine arts school in Villa Maria. In 1943 he was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship and visited New York to study prints at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He remained in the U.S. as a consequence of the rise of dictator Juan Perón, and in 1945 was appointed to the art faculty at the State University of Iowa.

At Iowa, Mr. Lasansky established a printmaking program that would become regarded as one the nation’s finest. A single print of his could utilize a variety of techniques—engraving, etching, and drypoint, among others—using multiple plates to create a unique image. His works are in the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, and other museums.

The simple medium of pencil and paper, by contrast, served as the basis of Mr. Lasansky’s powerful series, The Nazi Drawings, created during the 1960s. The 33 images, on loan to the UI Museum of Art, depict horrific images of human suffering and exploitation. “The Hitler years were in my belly,” Mr. Lasansky told the New York Times in 1967. “Why don’t I just put down what I feel? The fact is that people were killed…” A complete obituary of Mr. Lasansky appeared in the New York Times on April 8: www.nytimes.com/2012/04/08/arts/design/mauricio-lasansky-master-printmaker-dies-at-97.html

Note: As appropriate, Old Gold references the original name of our campus as the State University of Iowa. For more about the history of the name of our institution go to spectator.uiowa.edu/2010/december/oldgold.html

—David McCartney, University Archivist

Mauricio Lasansky in 1963, from Staff magazine, Staff and Faculty Vertical File (RG 01.15.03), folder “Lasansky, Mauricio”, University Archives, Department of Special Collections, University of Iowa Libraries

“Nazi Drawing #26” from the Lasansky Gallery, University of Iowa Museum of Art

Image of Catlett provided by Elizabeth Catlett; appearing in Arts and Sciences magazine (Iowa City: University of Iowa, 2003)

From Elizabeth Catlett’s thesis, “Sculpture in Stone: Negro Mother and Child” (T1940.C36), University Archives, Department of Special Collections, University of Iowa Libraries

Sketches from Elizabeth Catlett’s thesis, “Sculpture in Stone: Negro Mother and Child” (T1940.C36), University Archives, Department of Special Collections, University of Iowa Libraries