Kathleen Houlahan

Kathleen Houlahan moved to Seattle in 1901 and attended the University of Washington from 1902 to 1907. She also was a student and friend of the important American realist painter Robert Henri who strongly influenced her portrait style and paid for her to study at the Sorbonne in Paris.

Houlahan specialized in landscapes, portraits, and images of Native American life in the Southwest. She also painted an extensive series of floral still lifes in watercolor. She was most active as an artist between 1914 and 1938 exhibiting at national expositions and other major American art exhibitions as well as regionally. The Frye Art Museum held a retrospective of her work in 1968. She was part of the small circle of Seattle’s progressive artists interested in modern trends in American art.