Finding Cleopatra

Edmonia Lewis was the first sculptor of African American and Native American (Mississauga) descent to achieve international fame. Her 3,000-pound masterwork, The Death of Cleopatra, commemorated another powerful woman who broke with convention…and then the sculpture disappeared. On this return episode of Sidedoor, we find them both.

Transcript

Guests:

• Marilyn Richardson, art historian and independent curator
• Kirsten Pai Buick, professor of art historian at the University of New Mexico and author of Child of the Fire: Mary Edmonia Lewis and the Problem of Art History's Black and Indian Subject
• Karen Lemmey, the Lucy S. Rhame Curator of Sculpture at the Smithsonian American Art Museum

Smithsonian Links:

• You can see The Death of Cleopatra on display at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, read more about Edmonia Lewis in the Smithsonian Magazine, and explore her other works in the Smithsonian collection.
• Check out the Smithsonian American Art Museum's new exhibition, The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture featuring 82 artworks created between 1792 and 2023, including two by Edmonia Lewis. You'll also spot a work by Augustus Savage, who you might remember from Sidedoor's season eight episode The Monumental Imagination of Augustus Savage.