Lesbian Art Herstory: Frances Loring and Florence Wyle

A Young Girl by Wyle from E. Sweeney on Vimeo. “I love it” ~ Charlie Hill, Curator of Canadian Art,  National Gallery of Canada.

Lesbian Art Herstory: Frances Loring and Florence Wyle
Frances Loring (1881?-1968) and Florence Wyle (ca 1887-1968) artists and American bohemians living and working together in Toronto, Canada for almost 60 years.

And Beauty Answers: The Life of Frances Loring and Florence Wyle
by Elspeth Cameron
Cormorant Books Inc (2007)
ISBN-10: 1897151136
ISBN-13: 978-1897151136

Amazon.com’s description of the book: “All but forgotten, Frances Loring and Florence Wyle were major forces in establishing Canadian sculpture and the style of Canadian national monuments. Frances and Florence met in 1906 at the Chicago Art Institute, where Florence was a teacher and Frances a student. Immediately forming a connection that would endure the rest of their lives, they moved together in 1910 to a studio in bohemian Greenwich Village, before relocating to the more conservative city of Toronto. Removed from the Modernist movement that began to sweep the United States soon after their departure, Frances and Florence took up residence in a converted church where they entertained such prominent Canadian artists as Emmanuel Hahn, Elizabeth Wyn Wood, and Group of Seven member A.Y. Jackson.

And Beauty Answers by Elspeth Cameron reexamines the Girls’ careers, from their early days struggling to be recognized in a man’s profession, to their final days in separate rooms of a nursing home. Whatever the full extent of their relationship, the Girls continue to be defined as much by the bond they shared as by the works they created. And Beauty Answers explores a partnership that helped shape the landscape of Canadian art.”

Further reading – The Girls : a biography of Frances Loring and Florence Wyle by Rebecca Sisler. Toronto: Clarke Irwin, 1972. ISBN 978-0-7720-0578-6.