Louise McMahon Horwitz, Shanties on the Harbor
Watercolor, 12 x 17 in. (30.5 x 43.2 cm)
Although she was born in Oklahoma, artist Louise McMahan Horwitz spent most of her life as a painter and designer in St. Louis, Missouri. Louise studied art at various schools, including Washington University in St. Louis, while also training under other painters such as Arnold Blanch and Rollin Crampton. She was part of many group shows in Pittsburgh, Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, San Antonio, and the Netherlands, while also having various one-woman shows throughout galleries and museums in Missouri and New York.
While she won many awards over the expanse of her artistic career, Louise also worked to support other local artists as a prominent member of the St. Louis Artists’ Guild and was known to curate exhibitions of other local artists’ work, including a show of painter Joe Jones’ work in October 1963.
Aside from being a painter, Horwitz served as the art editor of Printed Word in St. Louis from 1933-1942. She also worked as art director along with her husband for their shared advertising agency, McMahon Horwitz Advertising Agency, from 1942-1960. Another career she had was public relations director at the City Art Museum in St. Louis.
She was best known for her depictions of mountain landscapes painted in both oil and watercolor, and her large, lamenting dark-eyed figures. Louise died in St. Louis, Missouri, in September 1970.
