biography of Ada Walter SHULZ (1870-1928)

Birth place: Terre Haute, IN

Death place: near Nashville, IN

Addresses: Nashville, IN, summers from 1908, permanently from 1917

Profession: Painter

Studied: AIC, with Vanderpoel and Oliver Pennet Grover; Vitti Acad., Paris; Munich.

Exhibited: AIC, 1917 (Municipal Purchase Prize), 1918 (hon. men.); Hoosier Salon, 1925 (prize), 1926 (prize), 1928 (prize); Chicago Galleries Assoc; H. Leiber Co., Indianapolis; Milwaukee Art Soc. Gallery, Dec., 1914 (with husband Adolph and son Walter); Indiana State Museum, Indianapolis, 1998 (first retrospective)

Member: Chicago Cordon Club; Indiana AC; Chicago Gal. Art; Brown County Gal. Assn. (founder)

Work: Milwaukee AI; Municipal Art Lg., Chicago Collection; Brown County Public Library (Mother and Two Children Outdoors")"

Comments: Specialty: impressionistic portrayals of mothers and children in outdoor settings. Married to Adolph Shulz (see entry) in 1894, the two artists established a joint studio in Munich in April, 1895. Returned to Delavan, WI, in September of that year. In 1908, she and her husband began spending their summers painting in Nashville (Brown County), IN, soon drawing other artists to the region and helping to establish the Brown County art colony. She also contributed magazine covers for The Advance (May, 1914), Woman's Home Companion (Jan, 1920), and Literary Digest (December, 1924). The Shulzes divorced in 1926. Their son Walter (see entry) had just embarked on his art career before his early death in 1918.

Sources: WW27; Gerdts, Art Across America, vol. 2: 273-74 (with repro.); Rachel Berenson Perry, The Paintings of Ada Walter Shulz," American Art Review vol. 10, no.1 (February, 1998): 94-101."