Mary Wright Gill
Mary Wright Gill | |
---|---|
Born | May 19, 1867 Washington, D.C., U.S. |
Died | October 30, 1929 Washington, D.C., U.S. |
Alma mater | DeLancey Walker Gill |
Scientific career | |
Fields | scientific illustration |
Institutions | Bureau of American Ethnology |
Mary Wright Gill (
Early life
Mary Wright Gill was born on May 19, 1867, in Washington, D.C. She was the daughter of Minna Wright (d. 1908) and had a brother, John Newton Wright.[2] As a girl, due to health issues, she was taken out of school and enrolled in the School of Design at the University of Cincinnati, and became the youngest student ever to enroll in that program. When she returned to Washington, she began drawing on contract with the BAE under the direction of John Wesley Powell.[3]
Some of her early work was featured as part of the
Career
Mary Wright Gill was renowned for her drawings of "fidelity and accuracy."[6] She worked as a contract artist for the Bureau of American Ethnology and produced many of the illustrations used in the BAE's annual reports,[7] such as Matilda Coxe Stevenson's The Zuni Indians.[8] She worked primarily in pen and ink, graphite, and watercolor. Her watercolor illustrations were sometimes composites based on series of photographs, lending them a hyperreal quality.[8]
Some of her illustrations, like the photographs taken by Stevenson, were not made with the same ethical protocols observed by
In addition to those for the BAE, she illustrated many notable publications and books, including the Manual of the Grasses, by Albert Spear Hitchcock.[10] During her career, she had formative friendships with prominent women illustrators such as Mary Agnes Chase; the two were among a group of women who had created a niche in the government for this professional line of work.[10] They also had a playful relationship; Mary Wright Gill illustrated a children's book Chase created of an orphaned squirrel she "adopted" and named "Toodles."[10]
Death and legacy
Mary Wright Gill died on October 30, 1929, in Washington, D.C.[1]
References
- ^ ISBN 978-0-9649101-0-2.
- ISSN 1941-0662. Retrieved 2019-12-02.
- ^ Langley, Samuel P. (1895). Expenditures of the Smithsonian Institution: Letter from the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 8.
- ISSN 2157-2143. Retrieved 2019-12-02.
- ^ Vickers, Thomas (1883). Seventh Annual Report of the Rector, University of Cincinnati. The Commercial Gazette Job Print. p. 940.
- ^ Howe, Marshall Avery (1919). Torreya: A Monthly Journal of Botanical Notes and News. p. 87.
- ^ Smithsonian's National Anthropological Archives. "MS7531: Miscellaneous drawings and illustrations by Mary Wright Gill". sova.si.edu. Retrieved 2019-12-02.
- ^ a b Stevenson, Matilda Coxe (1904). The Zuni Indians: their mythology, esoteric fraternities, and ceremonies. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. pp. 502.
- JSTOR 40170339.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-4696-1744-2.
External links
- https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/170401952/mary-gill
- Drawing by Mary Wright Gill of Ceremony, New-Fire, The Kwakwantu Society of Beggars 16 August 1896, BAE GN 01817B5 06310900, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
- Bureau of American Ethnology-Smithsonian Institution Illustrations 1880s-1960s National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
- MS 4108 Mary Wright Gill California Basin drawings, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.