Addressing paintings depicting idealized and allegorical female figures, this book presents a series of six case studies of US women artists.

Lisa N. Peters posits that the indirectness and subterfuge used in this type of works afforded nineteenth century women a means of self expression and self reflection, not otherwise easily available. The six case studies cover the artists Lilly Martin Spencer, Edith Mitchill Prellwitz, Ella Condie Lamb, Louise King Cox and Ella Ferris Pell. The artists used allegory's symbolic value for messages of female agency, intellect, self-sufficiency, and empathy, and through this appropriated and subverted a long artistic tradition. The cases studies reveal these women artists also used their work to suggest the complexities and identity issues they faced at the turn of the twentieth century when progress for women in society and the workforce was going through huge change. Revealing a body of overlooked and often forgotten works, the book not only fills a gap in art-historical considerations of the era but also reveals a female perspective that counterbalances that of the male artists whose work has thus far dominated the canon.

This book is ideal for scholars and students in art history, gender studies, American studies and history.