Anna Mary Robertson Moses (September 7, 1860 – December 13, 1961), popularly known as Grandma Moses, was an American folk artist. She began painting in earnest at the age of 78 and is a prominent example of a newly successful art career at an advanced age. Moses gained popularity during the 1950s, having been featured on a cover of Time Magazine in 1953. She was a subject of numerous television programs and of a 1950 Oscar-nominated biographical documentary. Her autobiography, titled My Life's History, was published in 1952. She was also awarded two honorary doctoral degrees.

Moses was a live-in housekeeper for a total of 15 years, starting at age 12. An employer noticed her appreciation for their prints made by Currier and Ives, and they supplied her with drawing materials. Moses and her husband began their married life in Virginia, where they worked on farms. In 1905, they returned to the Northeastern United States and settled in Eagle Bridge, New York. They had ten children, five of whom survived infancy. She embroidered pictures with yarn, until disabled by arthritis.

In her 1961 obituary, The New York Times said: "The simple realism, nostalgic atmosphere and luminous color with which Grandma Moses portrayed simple farm life and rural countryside won her a wide following. She was able to capture the excitement of winter's first snow, Thanksgiving preparations and the new, young green of oncoming spring ... In person, Grandma Moses charmed wherever she went. A tiny, lively woman with mischievous gray eyes and a quick wit, she could be sharp-tongued with a sycophant and stern with an errant grandchild."

Moses's work has been a subject of numerous museum exhibitions worldwide and has been extensively merchandised, such as on greeting cards. In 2006, her 1943 painting titled Sugaring Off was sold at Christie's New York for , setting an auction record for the artist.

Early life

thumb|Anna Mary Robertson in the 1860s|left|240x240px

Anna Mary Robertson was born in Greenwich, New York, on September 7, 1860; she was the third of ten children born to Margaret Shanahan Robertson and Russell King Robertson. She was raised with four sisters and five brothers. Her father ran a flax mill and was a farmer. She was inspired to paint by taking art lessons at school. As a child, she started painting using lemon and grape juice to make colors for her "landscapes"

At age 12, she left home and performed farm chores for a wealthy neighboring family. She continued to keep house, cook, and sew for wealthy families for 15 years. One of these families, the Whitesides, noticed her interest in their Currier and Ives prints and bought her chalk and wax crayons.]]

thumb|Anna Mary Robertson Moses with two of her children|219x219pxAt age 27, she worked on the same farm with Thomas Salmon Moses, a "hired man". They were married and established themselves near Staunton, Virginia, where they spent nearly two decades, living and working in turn on five local farms. Four of them are The Bell Farm or Eakle Farm, The Dudley Farm, Mount Airy Farm (now included within Augusta County's Millway Place Industrial Park), and Mount Nebo. To supplement the family income at Mount Nebo, Anna made potato chips and churned butter from the milk of a cow that she purchased with her savings. Later, the couple bought a farm,

Five of the ten children born to them survived infancy. Although she loved living in the Shenandoah Valley, in 1905 Anna and Thomas moved to a farm in Eagle Bridge, New York, at her husband's urging. When Thomas Moses was about 67 years of age in 1927, he died of a heart attack, after which Anna's son Forrest helped her operate the farm. She never married again. She retired and moved to a daughter's home in 1936. She was known as either "Mother Moses" or "Grandma Moses", and although she first exhibited as "Mrs. Moses", the press dubbed her "Grandma Moses", and the nickname stuck.

Decorative arts

As a young wife and mother, Moses was creative in her home; for example, in 1918 she used house paint to decorate a fireboard. Beginning in 1932, Moses used yarn to embroider pictures for friends and family.

Style

thumb|[[Fireboard decorated by Moses in 1918]]

Moses painted scenes of rural life

Her early style is less individual and more realistic or primitive, with a lack of knowledge of, or perhaps rejection of, basic perspective. Initially she created simple compositions or copied existing images. As her career advanced, she created complicated, panoramic compositions of rural life. She initially charged $3 to $5 for a painting, depending upon its size, and as her fame increased her works were sold for $8,000 to $10,000. A German fan said, "There emanates from her paintings a light-hearted optimism; the world she shows us is beautiful and it is good. You feel at home in all these pictures, and you know their meaning. The unrest and the neurotic insecurity of the present day make us inclined to enjoy the simple and affirmative outlook of Grandma Moses."

In 1944, Moses was represented by the American British Art Center and the Galerie St. Etienne, which increased her sales. Her paintings were exhibited throughout Europe and the United States over the next 20 years. During the 1950s, her exhibitions broke attendance records around the world. Art historian Judith Stein noted: "A cultural icon, the spry, productive nonagenarian was continually cited as an inspiration for housewives, widows and retirees." It was not as common as her winter landscapes. Originally purchased in the 1940s for under $10, the piece was assigned an insurance value of $60,000 by the appraiser, Alan Fausel.

Otto Kallir of the Galerie St. Etienne gave her painting July Fourth (1951) to the White House as a gift in 1952. The painting also appears on a U.S. commemorative stamp that was issued in Grandma Moses's honor in 1969.

Norman Rockwell and Grandma Moses were friends who lived across the Vermont–New York state border from each other. Moses lived in Eagle Bridge, New York, and after 1938 the Rockwells had a house in nearby Arlington, Vermont. She appears on the far left edge in the Norman Rockwell painting Christmas Homecoming, which was printed on The Saturday Evening Posts December 25, 1948, cover.

From March 15 to June 10, 2001, the National Museum of Women in the Arts exhibited Grandma Moses in the 21st Century, which examined “Moses’ artistic development, her place in the art world at the nexus of folk art, fine art, and popular culture, and the phenomenon of her success.”

From November 25, 2025-July 12, 2026, the Smithsonian American Art Museum exhibited Grandma Moses: A Good Day’s Work.  The exhibition was shown at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art September 12, 2026-March 29, 2027.  The catalog was edited by Leslie Umberger and Randall R. Griffey ().

Collections

This is a selection of the public collections of her work:

  • Bennington Museum in Bennington, Vermont, holds the largest public collection of Moses's paintings
  • Brooklyn Museum, New York City
  • Figge Art Museum, Davenport, Iowa
  • Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.
  • Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, NY
  • Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, Laurel, Mississippi
  • Maier Museum of Art at Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Virginia
  • Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, New York
  • Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
  • Muscarelle Museum of Art, William & Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia
  • National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington D.C.
  • The Phillips Collection, Washington D.C.
  • Smithsonian American Art Museum
  • University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City

Selected works

  • Sugaring Off, 1943, sold by Christie's in 2006 for US$1,360,000
  • Sugaring Off, 1943, used for a 1947 Christmas Card that became a bestseller for Hallmark Cards
  • Wash Day, 1945, Rhode Island School of Design Museum
  • A Fire in the Woods, 1947, National Gallery of Art
  • The Departure, 1951, Philadelphia Museum of Art
  • A Gay Time, March 27, 1953, 1953, oil on board, sold from the personal collection of Nancy and Ronald Reagan at 668 St. Cloud Road, Bel-Air, at Christie's, New York, 2016 for $93,750
  • Autumn in the Berkshires
  • Dividing of the Ways, 1947, oil and tempera on masonite, Collection American Folk Art Museum, New York
  • Haying Time, 1945
  • McDonnell Farm, 1943, The Phillips Collection
  • Hoosick Falls in Winter, 1944, The Phillips Collection
  • Hoosick Falls, 1944, Southern Vermont Arts Center
  • Thanksgiving Turkey, 1943
  • White Christmas
  • Bennington, 1953, Bennington Museum
  • The Battle of Bennington, 1953, Bennington Museum
  • Wagon Repair Shop, 1960, Bennington Museum

References

  • Jane Kallir, "Grandma Moses: The Artist Behind the Myth", The Clarion, Fall 1982.