Eloise Pickard Smith (August 6, 1921 – August 26, 1995) was an

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating the work of art. The most common usage (in both everyday speech and academic discourse) refers to a practitioner in the visual arts o ...

and the first director of the

California Arts Council The California Arts Council functions as a state agency headquartered in Sacramento, California. Its board comprises eight council members who receive appointments from both the Governor A governor is an politician, administrative leader and ...

in 1976, appointed by its creator, then Governor

Jerry Brown Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic P ...

. In 1977 she visited the

California Medical Facility California Medical Facility (CMF) is a male-only state prison medical facility located in the city of Vacaville in Solano County, California. It is older than California State Prison, Solano, the other state prison in Vacaville. Facilities ...

to judge an art show of work by incarcerated artists there. She was so inspired by what she saw, that she established the California Arts in Corrections Program later that year along with her husband, historian

Page Smith Page Smith (September 6, 1917 – August 28, 1995) was an American historian, professor and author. In 1964 he became the founding Provost of Cowell College, University of California, Santa Cruz and resigned from the university in 1973 in p ...

. She opened the first art gallery in 1966 on the

University of California Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located in Monterey Bay ...

's campus, which is now called The Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery. California Arts in Corrections operates as a partnership between the

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) is the penal law enforcement agency of the government of California responsible for the operation of the California state prison and parole systems. Its headquarters are in Sacra ...

(CDCR) and the

. Initial funding for the project came from the William James Association, an organization founded by philosopher Paul Lee and Smith's husband Page, and she founded its Prison Arts Project which is also active as of 2022. In 2021, her artwork was the subject of an exhibition in the Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery at UCSC alongside artwork by incarcerated artists involved with the Prison Arts Project. On August 26, 1995, Eloise Pickard Smith died from kidney cancer in her Santa Cruz home. Her husband,

, died within 36 hours. Their story of love through death was featured in a 1998 interview with their daughter, Ann Easly, and friend, John Dizikes, on

This American Life ''This American Life'' is a weekly hour-long American radio program produced in collaboration with Chicago Public Media and hosted by Ira Glass. It is broadcast on numerous public radio stations in the United States and internationally, and is ...

. Mary Holmes, a friend and colleague, said, "it's really like plants that are wrapped around each other. We couldn't even imagine the shape of a life he would have without her. Apparently he couldn't either."

References

External links

*
Actions Speak Louder
. ''This American Life''. 2017-12-12. Retrieved 2022-04-13. *
Eloise Pickard Smith Award
. ''www.scparks.com''. Retrieved 2022-04-13. * Robinson, John (1995-08-28),
Artist Eloise Pickard Smith dies: cancer claims wife of Page Smith
', retrieved 2022-04-13 *
Darkness, meet light: What Eloise Pickard Smith wrought
. ''Santa Cruz Sentinel''. 2017-11-01. Retrieved 2022-04-13. *
Eloise Smith and Sue Wilson go over some of the treasures the Art Museum of Santa Cruz County will be selling...
· SCPL Local History". ''history.santacruzpl.org''. Retrieved 2022-04-13. *
California's ambitious arts-in-prison program celebrates its Santa Cruz roots
. ''Santa Cruz Sentinel''. 2017-10-29. Retrieved 2022-04-13. *
Restoring arts for inmates a solution to California's overcrowded prisons: Guest commentary
. ''Daily News''. 2013-10-23. Retrieved 2022-04-13. * Bennett, Dick (1995-01-12)
''Eloise Pickard Smith: still learning about art''
retrieved 2022-05-05 {{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Eloise Pickard 20th-century American artists 1921 births 1995 deaths People from Durham, North Carolina