Edmonia Lewis (2024)

FAQs

What was Edmonia Lewis accused of? ›

During her time at Oberlin, Lewis was accused of attempting to poison her fellow classmate and roommate. While she was declared innocent after a trial, the abuse continued. A mob of white men kidnapped, beat, and left her to die in a field in the winter of 1862 because of the poisoning charge.

Hagar. 1875. Edmonia Lewis's sensitively carved Hagar (also known as Hagar in the Wilderness) depicts a heroine from the Old Testament, an Egyptian maidservant to Sarah, Abraham's wife. Sarah banishes her young servant to the wilderness in a jealous rage over Hagar's son Ishmael, whom Abraham fathered.

Personal life. Lewis never married and had no known children.

Both parents died early in her life, leaving her to live with her aunts. With financial aid from her brother, Lewis left New York to pursue a higher education.

Edmonia, one of a handful of students of color, regularly faced racism at Oberlin. In 1862, two white students accused her of trying to poison them. The university investigated and ruled that Edmonia was innocent. Shortly after, a group of white men kidnapped her and almost beat her to death.

Her father was Black, and her mother was Chippewa (Ojibwa) Indian. Orphaned at an early age, Lewis grew up in her mother's tribe where her life revolved around fishing, swimming, and making and selling crafts.

Hagar is a biblical character in the book of Genesis. She has an important role as wife of Abram/Abraham and mother of Ishmael. As such, she is an important figure within Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Hagar has long represented the plight of a foreigner, a slave, and a sexually abused woman. She has been the focal point for oppressed peoples. Her story resonates with sexual abuse survivors, the poor and vulnerable, and in the past half century with African American women.

In standard biblical commentaries of the twentieth century, scholars acknowledged Hagar's Egyptian origins but did not identify her racially as Black.

What inspired Edmonia Lewis? ›

During her first year in Rome, she produced Old Arrow Maker, which represents a portion of the story of Longfellow's "The Song of Hiawatha"—a poem that inspired several of her works. White artists typically characterized Native Americans as violent and uncivilized, but Lewis showed more respect for their civilization.

Upon Lewis' return to Rome, she received even more sculpture commissions. Between 1872 and 1879, she created more busts of abolitionists.

Lewis is believed to have been a part of a few notable, possibly romantic and sexual incidents with other females. An early “peculiar episode” is described in “African American Art and Artist” as taking place at Oberlin College on the morning of Jan. 27, 1862.

She was enrolled at McGrawville in 1856, during a turbulent time politically as the United States approached the Civil War. In 1859, Lewis, again with the financial support of her brother, enrolled at Oberlin College in Ohio to study art.

Edmonia Lewis, here in an An undated photo, was the first Black and Native sculptor to gain international fame. Many of her sculptures dealt with themes involving her Native American and Black heritage in the years after the Civil War and the end of slavery.

Lewis quickly achieved success as a sculptor. Inspired by the Emancipation Proclamation, she carved The Freed Woman and Her Child (1866) and Forever Free (1867). She subsequently turned to Native American themes and created The Marriage of Hiawatha (about 1868) and The Old Arrow Maker and His Daughter (1872).