Overcoming All Obstacles : The Women of the Academie Julian

This work examines late 19th century Paris's most famous training ground for the leading women artists of the period.

The Academie Julian was founded in Paris in 1868, initially to prepare students for entry to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the 19th century's preeminent art school. Because women could not study at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts until 1897, Julian itself became an international equivalent for many of the late 19th and early 20th century's most important women artists.

This publication accompanies an exhibition organized by the Dahesh Museum in New York.

The core of the book draws on the large collection of the Academie Julian Del Debbio, the Academie Julian's successor institution in Paris.

Not only does this work introduce the reader to many works of art by women artists - both known and less known - but the essays offer a cultural and historical context in which to appreciate the artwork.

Gabriel Weisberg's essay concentrates on the competitive training methods enforced by Rodolphe Julian and the teachers at the Academy. Jane Becker explores the competitive environment of the Academie Julian as it affected the Russian painter Marie Bashkirtseff and the Swiss painter Louise-Catherine Breslau.

Essays by Catherine Fehrer, the leading scholar of the Academie Julian, and Tamar Garb, an art historian who focuses on the training of women artists, give us an increased understanding of the place of the Academie Julian in the sphere of art education in Paris in the second half of the 19th century.