Anna Catherine Wiley (1879–1958)
By the Arbor
1923
Oil on canvas
26 x 30 inches
Museum purchase with funds from the 1996 Museum Gala; 1996.002

Tennessee native Anna Catherine Wiley produced By the Arbor, a striking impressionist painting of a woman standing in an arbor. Wiley was one of Knoxville, Tennessee's most talented and active artists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In addition to teaching art at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Wiley pursued an active career as an artist. She began her career as a gifted illustrator, receiving her training at the Art Students League of New York. However, it was her glowing impressionist canvases that gained her fame. She won many state and regional awards for her work. By the Arbor was first exhibited in 1923 at the annual show of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.