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Mothers in Art: Mother's Day at 100

March 29 - June 11, 2008

Joan Liffring-Zug Bourret, Navy Mothers and Anchor, Roosevelt Hotel, 1960s, gelatin silver print image on 14 x 11 in. paper, promised gift of the artist, L2004.053.
The origins of the modern Mother's Day observance can be traced back to Anna Jarvis, who following the death of her mother on May 9, 1905, sought to establish Mother's Day as a national and international holiday. While Julia Ward Howe wrote a Mother's Day Proclamation in 1870 as a call for peace and disarmament, the Mother's Day we celebrate today is the result of Anna Jarvis' efforts and the first such Mother's Day was celebrated in Grafton, West Virginia on May 10, 1908, in the church where Jarvis' mother taught Sunday school. The custom spread eventually to 45 states and in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson declared the first national Mother's Day holiday.

Mothers in Art: Mother's Day at 100 celebrates the 100th anniversary of the modest origins of the holiday in 1908 by presenting a number of works from the Museum's own collection that represent the ways mothers have been depicted in the history of art. This exhibition will be on view at the CRMA from March 29 through July 6, 2008.