Augusta Christine (Fells) Savage

Augusta Savage (American, 1892-1962)

An expressive sculptor, Savage studied at Cooper Union (1921-24) and exhibited with the Harmon Foundation (1928-31). Following such set-backs as a racially-motivated denial of summer coursework, Savage received a Rosenwald Fellowship to study in France, followed by a Carnegie Fellowship. In 1932, returned to NY, founded the influential Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts and the Harlem Artists Guild, and became director of the WAP’s Harlem Community Art Center. Her figurative sculpture The Harp was exhibited at the 1939 World’s Fair, while Gamin, a bust of a young boy, is perhaps her best known.

Important Source Material:

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Augusta Savage and the art schools of Harlem. New York, NY: The New York Public Library, 1988.

Leininger-Miller, Theresa A. New Negro artists in Paris: African American painters and sculptors in the city of light, 1922-1934, New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2001.

NHS