Untitled1930–1946Sheet: 11 x 8 1/2 " (27.9 x 21.6 cm)Graphite on paper (double-sided)Gift of Melinda R. Ahrens-Brancamp from the Virginia Ahrens Collection 2025.18.5a,b01684459347Virginia AhrensDrawingshttp://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster27212http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster10494Prairie du ChienPrairie du ChienUnited StatesWisconsinWorks on PaperVirginia’s Secret, Raz Gallery, Reedsburg, Wisconsin, November 3–18, 2000.
Trop d’Amour (Too Much Love), Portrait Society Gallery of Contemporary Art, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, June 10–August 5, 2023.Prairie du ChienVirginia Ahrens was not known in her lifetime as an artist, yet her private drawings reveal a rich, imaginative world shaped by fashion, fantasy, and self-invention. In 1995, her granddaughter, Melinda Rae Ahrens Brancamp, was sorting through a box of her late grandmother’s songbooks and sheet music, searching for a compelling composition to frame. Instead, she uncovered a folder of graphite drawings depicting women in various states of dress—some scantily clad in lingerie, others wrapped in velvet coats with fur collars—posed like starlets awaiting a photo-op.Dated between 1930 and 1946, these carefully rendered and strangely glamorous drawings showcase Ahrens’ private artistic practice. Many include handwritten inscriptions about the fabric, construction details, color palettes, and accessories of the women she draws. Some of the figures have risqué names—such as “Barbara Biche” and “Selma Sweetshitt”—while others, like “Blossom O’Dooley,” come with imagined backstories involving love affairs and aspirational careers. Art historian Debra Brehmer suggests that Ahrens’ drawing style, which features “line drawings of models, often from several perspectives,” was likely influenced by commercial sewing patterns from Butternick, Vogue, and Simplicity, as well as fashion advertisements found in newspapers and other printed media.The five drawings now offered as a gift to the Museum would be the first works by Ahrens to enter an institutional collection. This representative selection, which includes her earliest dated drawing, offers unique insight into Ahrens’ private imaginative world—one that explores her own sexual, social, and material fantasies—while also reflecting broader themes of fashion, femininity, and self-invention during a time when women’s creative expression was often confined to the domestic sphere.Object information is a work in progress and may be updated
with new research. Records are reviewed and revised, and the American Folk Art
Museum welcomes additional information.
To help improve this record, please email photoservices@folkartmuseum.orghttp://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster27212http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster10494http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster27212http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster10494http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster27212http://nodes.emuseum.com/BU1BGBAG/apis/emuseum/network/v1/vocabularies/termMaster1049419301946 2025 18 5a b Virginia Ahrens was not known in her lifetime as an artist, yet her private drawings reveal a rich, imaginative world shaped by fashion, fantasy, and self-invention. In 1995, her granddaughter, Melinda Rae Ahrens Brancamp, was sorting through a box of her late grandmother’s songbooks and sheet music, searching for a compelling composition to frame. Instead, she uncovered a folder of graphite drawings depicting women in various states of dress—some scantily clad in lingerie, others wrapped in velvet coats with fur collars—posed like starlets awaiting a photo-op.Dated between 1930 and 1946, these carefully rendered and strangely glamorous drawings showcase Ahrens’ private artistic practice. Many include handwritten inscriptions about the fabric, construction details, color palettes, and accessories of the women she draws. Some of the figures have risqué names—such as “Barbara Biche” and “Selma Sweetshitt”—while others, like “Blossom O’Dooley,” come with imagined backstories involving love affairs and aspirational careers. Art historian Debra Brehmer suggests that Ahrens’ drawing style, which features “line drawings of models, often from several perspectives,” was likely influenced by commercial sewing patterns from Butternick, Vogue, and Simplicity, as well as fashion advertisements found in newspapers and other printed media.The five drawings now offered as a gift to the Museum would be the first works by Ahrens to enter an institutional collection. This representative selection, which includes her earliest dated drawing, offers unique insight into Ahrens’ private imaginative world—one that explores her own sexual, social, and material fantasies—while also reflecting broader themes of fashion, femininity, and self-invention during a time when women’s creative expression was often confined to the domestic sphere.Object information is a work in progress and may be updated
with new research. Records are reviewed and revised, and the American Folk Art
Museum welcomes additional information.
To help improve this record, please email photoservices@folkartmuseum.org