The Willits Center for the Arts is pleased to present an engaging lecture by Professor Paula
Birnbaum titled Self-Fashioning as Modern Women Artists in Paris. This illuminating talk will
explore the lives and works of three remarkable Paris-based women artists—Maria Blanchard
(1881–1932), Tamara de Lempicka (1894–1980), and Chana Orloff (1888–1968)—all émigrés
who forged influential careers during the interwar period.
Professor Birnbaum will delve into how these artists navigated and redefined prevailing artistic
norms through their explorations of female embodiment. Central themes include self-
representation, portraiture, motherhood, and the female nude—expressed through painting in the
work of Blanchard and Lempicka, and sculpture in Orloff’s art. Together, these pioneering
women challenged artistic conventions and reshaped both the trajectory of modern art and the
cultural politics of their time.