The prints and paintings of Isabel Bishop (1902 – 1988) record the dynamic movement of the people she observed from her 14th Street studio in Union Square. Inspired by the realism of New York’s Ashcan school as well as by Rembrandt’s depictions of common people, Bishop rejected lofty themes in her art and portrayed her subjects – homeless men, working women, busy students – in the middle of candid movements.

Although it was considered inappropriate for women artists to study naked models, Bishop produced many images of female nudes. She chose average models from the streets of Manhattan and often rendered them in a state of physical activity – a sharp departure from the idealized, passive nudes of previous traditions. Deeply inspired by Flemish Baroque painters like Rubens, Bishop’s studies of human activity often unify figures with prominent backgrounds in what she called a “seamless web” of movement.

Miracle of Movement features twenty works from NMWA’s collection, including seventeen prints and paintings generously bequeathed to NMWA in 2004 by Catherine Gamble Curran. Ranging in date from 1927 to 1984, they are exemplary studies of daily life in Manhattan.