Quita Broadhead

Quita Broadhead is best-known for her mid-20th century abstract works that deconstruct landscape and portaiture. Her work is abstracted into plays of light and shadow as she engaged new ways of addressing form and line.

Brodhead, who was born Marie Waggamann Berl in Wilmington, Delaware, grew up around the Philadelphia area, studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from 1919–25, spent time painting in Paris at the Académie Julian, and left PAFA in 1925 to study under her mentor Arthur B. Carles. She was highly prolific and active in the Philadelphia area, served on the PAFA board, and spent several non-consecutive years of her life painting in Europe, where she exhibited with Kandinsky.