Sheila Levrant de Bretteville, director of graduate studies in graphic design at the Yale School of Art, is one of four artists who will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Women’s Caucus for Art this month.
Sheila Levrant de Bretteville (Photo by Michael Marsland / Yale University)The award, initially presented in 1979, was the first to recognize the contribution of women to the arts and their effect on society.
De Bretteville, who is also the Caroline M. Street Professor of Art, received her bachelor’s degree in art history from Barnard College and a bachelor and masters degree in fine arts from Yale. She was designated a “Design Legend” by the American Institute of Graphic Arts in 2006 and a “Grandmaster” by the New York Art Directors Club in 2008. De Bretteville’s numerous award-winning publications on art and culture include books, posters, and magazines. Her posters and fine press editions are in the special collections at New York’s Museum of Modern Art and London’s Victoria and Albert Museum. De Bretteville’s site specific work began with the first public art ordinances passed in 1985, and are permanently installed on both coasts of the United States, as well as abroad.
In 1970, de Bretteville was the first and only woman on the design school faculty at the California Institute of the Arts. The following year, she created the first women’s design program at the institute. In 1973, de Bretteville co-founded the Woman’s Building and created and ran its Women’s Graphic center until 1983, when she initiated and chaired the Department of Communication Design and Illustration at Otis College of Art and Design. In 1990, de Bretteville joined Yale as the School of Art’s first tenured woman professor.
Founded in 1972, the Women’s Caucus for Art is a national organization with a multidisciplinary, multicultural membership of artists, art historians, students, educators, and museum professionals. Its mission is “to create community through art, education, and social activism.” For more information, visit the organization’s website.
