Ceramics and St. Louis: The artistic career of Kathryn E. Cherry

From 1909 to 1914, the St. Louis suburb University City hosted a faculty of renowned ceramic artists. Adelaide Robineau, Taxile Doat, Frederick Rhead, Emile Diffloth, and Kathryn E. Cherry worked at the University City Art Academy as part of the People’s University. Founded in 1909 by Edward G. Lewis to provide correspondence courses to American Woman’s League members, the People’s University provided education to women in a variety of subjects.[1] Correspondence courses instructed students across the country through letter writing, which was invaluable at a time when most women couldn’t afford, or weren’t allowed, to go to college.[2] These restrictions led to the increased popularity of porcelain painting for women because it could be done on a small scale in the home.[3] Ceramics created by the faculty were influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement, which valued simplified aesthetics while abstracting natural forms, such as florals or animals. Socially progressive at its core, the Arts and Crafts movement gave women a greater sense of personal liberty by allowing them access to higher education and providing a space in which they could profit from their own labor.[4]

As an instructor at the school, Kathryn E. Cherry was a highly accomplished ceramic painter. Born in Quincy, Illinois, in 1871, Cherry began her artistic studies in 1889 at the St. Louis School of Fine Arts—as the Saint Louis Art Museum was known when it was part of Washington University—and continued her education at the New York School of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. After finishing her studies, Cherry taught and exhibited her work, during which time she established herself as a ceramic painter. She acquired gold medals at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, the Chicago Art Institute in 1907 and 1911, and the Panama–Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915.[5] All told, she received more than 28 awards and participated in almost 100 exhibitions.[6]

While at University City Art Academy, Cherry wrote to students, teaching them about painting ceramics. Simultaneously, she produced porcelain that was influenced by Asian aesthetics.[7] Her pieces from this period are often asymmetrical, with soft backgrounds and a restrained color palette, which can be seen in her vase from around 1910–1911. Unfortunately, the school closed in 1914, at which point Cherry took a post as art director at Principia College in Elsah, Illinois, where she remained until her death in 1931. After shifting her attention from porcelain to canvas, her impressionistic paintings from the later part of her life have a vibrancy that makes the scenes come to life. Her 1923 piece Fish, Fruits, and Flowers displays her adept use of color to convey textures in her work. Her skills as a ceramicist are also evident in the scene, with her inclusion of several beautifully detailed vases and bowls.

During Women’s History Month, take time to consider the ways in which women like Kathryn E. Cherry have contributed to the arts. In May 2022 Cherry’s recently acquired Vase from c.1910–1911 will be installed in the Anheuser-Busch Foundation Gallery 335, and her painting Fish, Fruits, and Flowers will be on view in the Charles Oscar Nelson and Anne Nelson Gallery 329.