Helen Kiner McCarthy

Landscape, still-life, and portrait painter; founding member of the Philadelphia Ten

Helen K. McCarthy, known for her painted landscapes, was an original member of the women’s artist group the Philadelphia Ten.

By Eve Perry

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I. Biography

Helen K. McCarthy was born in Poland, Ohio, in 1884. She studied at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, now the Moore College of Art and Design, with Impressionist Henry B. Snell and landscape painter Elliot Dangerfield. McCarthy is best known as an original member of the Philadelphia Ten (also known as the Ten Philadelphia Painters), a women’s artist group founded by artists trained at the Philadelphia School of Design and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. In an era when many women artists sought to de-gender their work in the hope of competing in a male-dominated field, the members of the Philadelphia Ten banded together, exhibiting as a group to gain prominence. McCarthy participated in the group’s annual exhibitions, which had a total run of nearly three decades from 1917 to 1945. McCarthy was also a member of Philadelphia’s Plastic Club, founded in 1897, which provided a social and professional network for women artists as well as exhibition opportunities at the club’s gallery on South Camac Street. In 1998, McCarthy’s work was included in the Moore College of Art and Design’s retrospective of the Philadelphia Ten, which was accompanied by an exhibition catalogue devoted to the group.

II. Chronology

• 1888 Born September 6 in Poland, Ohio
• 1904 Began studies at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women
• 1914 Awarded Gold medal from the Plastic Club, Philadelphia
• 1917 First exhibition of the Philadelphia Ten
• 1918 Awarded Mary Smith Prize from the Pennsylvania Academy of Art
• 1919 Awarded a prize from the National Association of Women Artists
• 1926 Awarded a prize from the National Association of Women Artists
• 1927 The artist died
• 1930 First Helen K. McCarthy Memorial Prize awarded by National Academy of Design
• for best landscape by a woman artist, forty years old or younger
• 1998 “The Philadelphia Ten: A Women’s Artist Group 1917–1945” retrospective held at
• Moore College of Art and Design

III. Exhibitions

• 1910-11 Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art
• 1911 Art Institute of Chicago
• 1912 The Plastic Club, Philadelphia
• 1914 The Plastic Club, Philadelphia
• 1916-20 Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art
• 1917 Art Club of Philadelphia
• 1918 Art Institute of Chicago
• 1919 National Association of Women Artists
• 1920 City Art Museum, St. Louis
• 1922 Art Institute of Chicago
• 1925-27 Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art
• 1926 National Association of Women Artists
• 1929 Milch Gallery, New York (Helen K. McCarthy Memorial Exhibition)
• 1998 Moore College of Art and Design retrospective of the Philadelphia Ten

IV. Memberships

• The Plastic Club
• International Society of Arts and Letters
• Association of Women Painters and Sculptors
• National Association of Women Artists
• New York Society of Painters

V. Suggested Resources

• City Art Museum of St. Louis. Special Exhibition Catalogue: Series 1916. (St. Louis: City Art Museum of St. Louis, 1916).
• Falk, Peter Hastings, ed. Who Was Who in American Art 1664-1975. Vol. 3 (Madison, CT: Sound View Press, 1999).
• Talbott, Page, and Patricia Tanis, Sydney. The Philadelphia Ten, A Women’s Artist Group 1917-1945. (Philadelphia: Galleries at Moore, 1998).