Kentucky Women: Enid Yandell

Kentucky Women: Enid Yandell

Opened July 17, 2019
Kentucky Gallery

October 2019 marks the 150th birthday of Louisville-born and nationally-renowned sculptor Enid Yandell. To celebrate this milestone, and the publication of a new biography of Yandell by Juliee Decker, the Speed is presenting a fresh look at Yandell’s career. Comprised of works drawn from the Speed’s permanent collection and private loans, Kentucky Women: Enid Yandell will contextualize the world in which Enid lived, as a young woman living and working in turn-of-the-century Louisville, Paris, and New York City. As a working artist, Yandell competed for major commissions and completed works for private clients. As a young woman with an activist’s heart, she involved herself with volunteer efforts during World War I, eventually serving as Director for the Bureau of Communications for the American Red Cross in New York, and actively supported the women’s suffrage movement.

Outside of the Museum at the Rhode Island School of Design, the Speed owns the largest collection of works by Yandell. The exhibition will be the third show presented by the Speed – the first being in 1941, and the second in 1993. This exhibition will be the first to situate the world in which Yandell lived and worked as a female artist navigating a career in a field that favored male artists, and the challenges and opportunities associated with her work.


Public programs affiliated with Kentucky Women: Enid Yandell are as follows: