NMWA xChange: Suzanne Valadon, Rebel with a Cause

This monthly talk show, a spin-off of the 2021 GLAMi award-winning series BMA x NMWA, connects viewers to NMWA and its mission to champion women artists. Join us as hosts from the museum interview special guests, including artists, educators and curators; consider topics relevant to our world; and offer insight into collaborations that the museum is fostering while its building is closed for renovation. In this episode of NMWA xChange, NMWA’s Associate Curator Virginia Treanor, PhD, and Senior Educator Adrienne L. Gayoso welcome Orin Zahra, NMWA’s assistant curator, and Nancy Ireson, PhD, Barnes Foundation’s Deputy Director for Collections and Exhibitions & Gund Family Chief Curator, to discuss the unconventional life and work of French painter Suzanne Valadon (1865–1938). Valadon defied conventions by rendering the nude female body. In doing so, she transformed the genre by providing an insightful expression of women’s experiences. We will share insights into two of the museum’s treasured Valadon paintings currently on loan. "The Abandoned Doll" (1921) is featured in the special exhibition "Mother!" at Kunsthalle Mannheim (Germany) from October 1, 2021, through February 6, 2022, and "Nude Arranging Her Hair" (ca. 1916) is on view in the special exhibition "Suzanne Valadon: Model, Painter, Rebel" at the Barnes Foundation (Philadelphia) until January 9, 2022. Nancy Ireson is the Barnes Foundation’s Deputy Director for Collections and Exhibitions & Gund Family Chief Curator. A specialist in European art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Ireson joined the Barnes in August 2018 and most recently curated "Suzanne Valadon: Model, Painter, Rebel." She began her curatorial career at the National Gallery, London, in 2005, after completing a PhD at the Courtauld Institute of Art. She worked at the Victoria & Albert Museum and the Courtauld Gallery, and was the Rothman Family Associate Curator at the Art Institute of Chicago before becoming Curator, International Art at Tate Modern, London in 2015.