![Mary Paulina Corbett, “[Josie And Betty are riding the Horses in the Field.] from the Catville …](/internal/media/dispatcher/27996/preview)
![Mary Paulina Corbett, “[Josie And Betty are riding the Horses in the Field.] from the Catville …](/internal/media/dispatcher/27996/full)
Mary Paulina Corbett
(1930–2019)
BornUpland, Pennsylvania, United States
ActiveBooths Corner, Pennsylvania, United States
BiographyIn hundreds of imaginative drawings produced over a decade in the mid-twentieth century, Mary Paulina Corbett chronicled the adventures of the “Catville Kids.” Most of the pieces deal with the happenings of daily life, from romantic encounters and trips to the pool to parties and gossipy meetups at the soda fountain, but they are made more fantastic by regular cameos of the masked Lone Ranger and recurring animal-human hybrid characters. These cat- and dog-headed figures—including “Ackie Puss” and “Dogie Bark”—are part of a cast of twenty-four characters inspired by Corbett’s extended family, friends, and the animals on her family farm in Pennsylvania. Most of the drawings are double-sided, with saturated colored pencil and watercolor detail alongside annotations of characters, dialogue, and the date and time of their creation. The works show the influence of popular culture, particularly film, television, and children’s literature, and her homemade scrapbook holds clippings and photographs of the stars of the day.Born in 1930, Corbett spent almost her entire life on a farm in Booths Corner, Delaware County. She worked as a bookkeeper and, in addition to her drawings, is known to have designed and dressed dolls. She kept her art practice private, with 714 drawings coming to light only after the two boxes containing them were removed from her attic and sold at an estate sale, from which they were acquired in 2015 by the architect David Knapp.
Corbett was then living in a nursing facility. Before her death in 2019, the new owner of her art was able to connect with her and learn that she had created the drawings from 1942 to 1951, when she was between the ages of twelve and twenty-one. More than a hundred of Corbett’s works on paper, now at the American Folk Art Museum, reveal how she expanded her techniques over time as her art became more sophisticated and less cartoonish, such as in her later ink-wash pieces.
Allison C. Meier and Valérie Rousseau, 2025
Text written as part of “Rethinking Biography,” an initiative supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).