Hilda Morris
American, 1911-1991
- Names
Hilda Morris
Morris, Hilda
- Born
Pittsburgh 1911
- Active
- Died
Orange 1991
- Occupation or Type
painter
sculptor
Northwest artist
Oregon artist
- Bio
In 1938 Hilda Morris moved to Spokane to work in the sculpture department of the WPA Art Center. She headed the Federal Art Project in Seattle in 1940-1941 where she met and married a young painter, Carl Morris. By this time she had gained international fame as a sculptor. They moved to Portland in 1941 and she joined the staff of the Museum Art School where she taught until 1943. She began exhibiting paintings including watercolors that served as studies for sculpture. The importance of angle and stroke was demonstrated both in her sculpture and her painting. Her later sumi ink work shows strong Asian influence. "What counts is the initial gesture." She favored root-like shapes and the circle as subjects. Titles "ancient" and "primal" often appear. She and her husband Carl won the Governor's Award for the Arts in 1985.
Artist biography reproduced with permission from the authors, Oregon Painters: the First Hundred Years (1859-1959), Ginny Allen and Jody Klevit.
- Gender
Female
- Related People
Teacher of: Mary Davis (American, 1907-1989)