James Kalm visits Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry at the Jewish Museum, New York, on view through September 4, 2017.

Kalm notes: “Through her involvement in the art world Stettheimer came in contact with the most advanced members of the avant-garde who had flocked to New York, like Marcel Duchamp and Francis Picabia. Not having to paint for profit, the artist was free to develop a unique style which was a precursor of Surrealism and featured her own extravagant and decorative sensibilities. She captured and documented her vanishing social milieu using these singular means.”