Article
Dreier, Katherine S. (1877–1952) By Saletnik, Jeffrey
Article
An impresario, collector, and painter, Katherine Dreier directed her attention and personal wealth to the promotion of European modernism in the United States, most notably by co-founding the Société Anonyme, Inc. in 1920 with Marcel Duchamp. Dreier guided the group’s lecture series; art and library acquisitions; publications, including the short-lived journal Brochure Quarterly; and its program of exhibitions, among them the first exclusively devoted to Fernand Léger in the United States and, in 1926, the International Exhibition of Modern Art at the Brooklyn Museum. These intermittent and often small-scale initiatives were relatively ineffective in achieving Dreier’s goal of introducing the international avant-garde to an American audience; however, the collection she assembled in the group’s name remains significant, as does her personal art collection. She deposited the former at Yale University. Dreier exhibited her own paintings at the 1913 Armory Show, among other venues.