Deana Mallory, Director of Public Programs for the Bennington Museum, will give an illustrated talk on the life of Grandma Moses on Sunday, February 7, at 2 pm at the Stephentown Historical Society’s Heritage Center, Garfield Road (County Route 26), Stephentown, New York. The program is free and the building is handicapped accessible. For directions, telephone (518) 733-0010.
[private]The folk artist we know as Grandma Moses was born Anna Mary Robertson in 1860 in Greenwich, New York. After her marriage to Thomas Moses, they worked farms near Staunton, Virginia, for nearly twenty years. They returned to farm in Eagle Bridge, New York, in 1905. Her early artistic creations were in embroidery and quilting. She began painting rural scenes when in her late 70s and was ‘discovered’ by the art world and an eager public when in her 80s. She was a woman who liked to keep busy and said, “If I didn’t start painting, I would have raised chickens.” She died in 1961.
The Bennington Museum has a large collection of her art and belongings, as well as the one-room schoolhouse she had attended. Mallory will tell of Grandma Moses’ life and some of its colorful stories, including her brief career as a potato chip saleswoman.
Mallory, a Petersburgh, New York, resident, has been at the Bennington Museum for ten years. She has a Bachelor’s degree in anthropology and a Master’s degree in education.[private]