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The Woman's Building of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago was designed by Sophia Hayden, the first woman graduate in architecture at MIT. The central hall had a Mary Cassatt mural of women harvesting fruit on the south wall of the clerestory. The Building exhibited the art and craft of women from many different countries. Berthe Honore Palmer, a wealthy Chicago socialite, led an international campaign to raise over a hundred thousand dollars for the building, in addition to the art exposition, there were many cultural and political assemblies, among them, the first Woman's Congress an international forum in which women shared their experiences and research about their role in the world. The Woman's Building was run by the Board of Lady Managers, made up of 115 women; physicians, temperance workers, suffragists, lawyers artists, writers, and community leaders. The Board of Lady Managers also maintained the Children's Department which included a child care center for visitors at the Fair. [[image]] [[caption]] Woman's Building designed by Sophia Hayden. USA [[/caption]] [[image]] [[caption]] Interior. Woman's Building [[/caption]] Four women-Sheila de Bretteville, designer, Arlene Raven, art historian, Judy Chicago, painter, and Edie Gross, painter initiated the founding of the Los Angeles Woman's Building in September 1973. Their purpose was to build a support community for women in the arts by creating a public space where women's art could be shown and the first feminist art school in the country, the Feminist Studio Workshop, could develop. The Building continues to be a place of participation in the arts, collaboration of women in a variety of cultural and social activities and a place of exchange of women's services. The community in the Building has expanded and now includes the Feminist Studio Workshop; the Extension Program; the Summer Art Program; the Woman's Graphics Center; the Woman's Switchboard; Womantours; Sisterhood Bookstore; seven Galleries-Grandview I&II, the Community Gallery, the Open Wall Show, the Upstairs Gallery, the Floating Gallery, the Coffeehouse/Photo Gallery; and Dr. Susan Kuhner, feminist psychologist. The Woman's Building is run by a Board of Lady Managers which is currently conducting a search and fundraising for a new Woman's Building. The Woman's Building is the place in time and space which defines our community and, in turn, is the us which it symbolizes at any given moment. We gather here to gather ourselves, each into her own center, and to gather together, each out of her own center shaping with her own contribution the shape of us. From this process we truly come to share our values and vision. We can give testimony. We have experienced that. We are our community, and our community lives in each of us. We are the Woman's Community; we live and grow in the Woman's Building. Arlene Raven [[image]] [[caption]] Entry into the Woman's Building [[/caption]]
