Jean Crawford Adams

Jean Crawford Adams was born in Chicago in 1884. She studied at the Art Institute of Chicago with Charles Hawthorne and George Bellows. In 1914, she won an Honorable Mention in portraiture. She also studied in Paris under Andre L’Hote, where she developed a unique Fauvist and Cubist style of painting, which she applied to her American landscapes and urban images of Chicago. She painted both abroad and throughout the United States. In Chicago, she was represented by Chester Johnson Galleries. While in Chicago in the 1930s, she also worked with the Federal Art Project of Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration (WPA). Adams works were included in the notable annual exhibitions of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the Carnegie Institute, the Detroit Museum, and the Art Institute of Chicago. During her artistic career, she exhibited 50 works of art at the prestigious Annual Exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago between 1915 and 1948. Adams work is best recognized for its vibrant color and fluid brushwork. The artist died in 1972 at the age of 86.