Leonor Fini was befriended by the whole Parisian artistic community and was one of the most photographed people of the 20th century, resulting in the legacy of “queen of the Paris art world” (expression coined by art critic Sarah Kent). Her popularity in artistic social circles made her the subject of many poems, artworks, and photographs by various artists and writers of her time.
Taeuber-Arp is not as well-known as other artists in her circle, despite her deep involvement with the burgeoning European avant-garde and the presence of her works in museum collections across the world. However, this reputation is changing, as evidenced by the 1981 retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York that subsequently traveled to Chicago, Houston, and Montreal. Her work is now generally accepted as part of the story of modernism and Dada, and has drawn increasing attention from scholars and academics. Her work was influential to the growth of Feminist Art of the 1960’s, who viewed her as a trailblazer.
In the 1980s, many women artists felt their careers were precarious enough that they could not succeed as artists and fight the feminist battle too. The Guerrilla Girls proved them wrong. They succeeded in transforming the relationship between art and politics. They made activism seem not only acceptable, but vital to full participation in the art world.
Goncharova’s Rayonist and Futurist work influenced many of her Russian contemporaries, including Kazimir Malevich and Vladimir Tatlin. In turn, two major new art movements were coined in Russia, Suprematism and Constructivism. Figurative scenes that had been fragmented into shards by Goncharova and Larinov became more and more abstract with only geometrical spaces recognizable as particular forms in the work of Malevich. This lead to a wave of abstract work being produced in Russia and Europe more widely.
In the artist’s later years, while her work as a painter received little attention, she was well known for her stage and costume designs, which were influenced by Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, the most innovative of ballet companies which had a long-lasting impact on dance, theatre, and opera productions. In the 21st century her work has again risen to the forefront, and she is today considered a leading Russian painter.
Delaunay’s textile designs extended the range of her influence into fashion, home decor and the theater. Her ability to introduce art into regular life by creating and wearing clothing, and living in spaces that were of her own design, can be seen as an early form of performance art, inspiring contemporary artists such as Marina Abramovic.
Adah Matilda Robinson was an American artist, designer and teacher, who influenced many other artists, particularly architects, during the early and mid-1900s. She was the first art teacher at Tulsa High School, where her students would include aspiring artist Bruce Goff and future architect Joseph R. Koberling, Jr. In 1928, she was hired as the founder and chairperson of the University of Tulsa Art Department.
Robinson was primarily a painter and a printmaker, as well as an art teacher. Although she never considered herself an architect, nor did she have any formal training in the subject, she is best known for her role in designing Tulsa’s Boston Avenue Methodist Church. The building was later named a National Historic Landmark and considered an exceptional example of Art Deco architecture. During her lifetime, many people did not believe that a woman could be responsible for such a work, and argued that her student, Goff, was primarily responsible.
In 1948, after a University of Tulsa official disputed her role in the design of the church, she resigned her position after 20 years at the school and accepted a similar role at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, retiring in 1959.