Delilah Williams Pierce (March 3, 1904 – 1992) was an

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

artist, curator and educator based in Washington,

District of Columbia Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and Federal district of the United States, federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from ...

. Pierce is best known for

abstract paintings Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a Composition (visual arts), composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. ''Abstract art'', ''non-figurative art'', ''non- ...

depicting the natural world. Her work also includes

portrait A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face is always predominant. In arts, a portrait may be represented as half body and even full body. If the subject in full body better r ...

ure,

landscape A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or human-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes th ...

s, and

still life A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, human-m ...

s. One of her works is in the permanent collections of the

Smithsonian Museum of American Art The Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM; formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds one of the world's lar ...

. A month before her death in 1992, she obtained an honorary degree from the University of the District of Columbia, Washington, DC (DHL). She supported local education.

Education

* Dunbar High School, Washington, D.C. * 1923 Teachers Certification, Miner Normal School, Washington, D.C. * 1925 Domestic Art Education Diploma, Miner Normal School, Washington, D.C. * 1931 BS,

Howard University Howard University is a private, historically black, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C., United States. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and accredited by the Mid ...

, Washington, D.C. * 1939 MA,

Teachers College, Columbia University Teachers College, Columbia University (TC) is the graduate school of education affiliated with Columbia University, a private research university in New York City. Founded in 1887, Teachers College has been a part of Columbia University since ...

, New York, New York

Notable works

*''

DC Waterfront, Maine Avenue ''DC Waterfront, Maine Avenue'' is a painting by Delilah Pierce. It is in the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. in the United States. Pierce used oil paint on board, in 1957, to depict Maine Avenue (Washington, ...

'', 1957, Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C. *
Gayhead Cliffs, Martha's Vineyard
', not dated, Howard University Art Gallery, Washington, D.C.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pierce, Delilah W. 1904 births 1992 deaths African-American women artists Painters from Washington, D.C. 20th-century American women educators 20th-century African-American women 20th-century African-American educators 20th-century American educators American women curators American curators

Education

Notable works

Further reading

References