“As a leading figure in the feminist art movement, [Shapiro] has encouraged and challenged the aspirations of countless women artists for a bright future. Her impact is seen in the feminist art history courses taught throughout colleges and universities and in the number of women artists now represented in many art history texts.” –Carol Salus

Miriam Schapiro (b. Toronto, 1923) — painter, “femmagist,” sculptor, and printmaker — primarily lived and worked in New York and California. She received her B.A. in 1945, M.A. in 1946, and M.F.A. in 1949 at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Schapiro is a renowned artist and teacher who is known as a leader of two art movements: the Feminist Art Movement and Pattern and Decoration. During her career, Schapiro received The National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, the Ford Foundation Grant, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, the Skowhegan Medal for Collage, and the Rockefeller Foundation Grant for Artistʼs Residency at the Bellagio Study and Conference Center in Italy. The Miriam Schapiro Archives for Women Artists at Rutgers University was established in January 2006.

Her work appears in major museum collections in the United States, Europe, Australia, and Israel, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC; The Museum of Modern Art, NYC; The Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC; The Brooklyn Museum, NYC; The Hirshorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington DC; The National Gallery of Art, Washington DC; The National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; The Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA; The Orlando Museum, Orlando FL; The Polk Museum of Art, Lakeland, CA; Louisiana Museum, Denmark; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Australia; The Israel Museum, Tel Aviv.