Early art activities at Hull-House focused on educating taste by exposing neighborhood people to fine art. As the workers at the settlement began to know and understand their neighbors, the arts programs changed to incorporate and encourage the talents of neighborhood residents. Children became a special focus for settlement art programs, since they were believed to have an innate instinct for art that must be carefully nurtured.

At Hull-House, women students could work among their peers in the same classes and studio space. Resident artists enjoyed respectable living space in an atmosphere that encouraged experimentation and creativity and allowed them to combine their aesthetic activities and their interest in social reform. Led by several talented and energetic women, the visual and craft arts at Hull-House were vibrant and active programs throughout the span of the settlement house's history. The arts programs produced a number of successful artists and gave many neighborhood residents exposure to the joy of creation.

Enella Benedict (1858-1942)
Enella Benedict came to Hull-House in 1893 and directed the art program for over forty years. Benedict guided the studio program through an expansion that drew in adults, children, and a number of professional artists who came to paint in the neighborhood.

Photograph, Jane Addams Hull-House Museum

Benedict's surviving artwork generally shows no neighborhood influence. This pastel is unusual in its depiction of a neighborhood scene.

Pastel, "Going Home," by Enella Benedict, gift of Mary Young, Jane Addams Hull-House Museum.

Young Hull-House art students were encouraged to use their imaginations to paint the alley as if it were clean. A civics lesson thus became part of the art lesson.

Photograph, University of Illinois Chicago, The University Library, Jane Addams Memorial Collection, JAMC Neg. 350

Ellen Gates Starr (1859-1940)
Ellen Gates Starr, co-founder of Hull-House, believed art was a necessity for individual spiritual health and the democratic health of the nation. She organized art exhibitions at Hull-House, taught art history classes, and helped found the Chicago Public School Art Society and the Chicago Arts and Crafts Society.

Photograph, University of Illinois Chicago, The University Library, Jane Addams Memorial Collection, JAMC Neg 3567.

The Hull-House Labor Museum was opened in 1900to showcase the craft talents of neighborhood immigrants. It had six departments: textiles, metal working,wood working, grains, pottery, and Ellen Gates Starr's bookbindery. Jane Addams hoped the Labor Museum would inspire children to an appreciation of their parent's skills and educate young industrial workers about their place in the history of their crafts. This textile was woven in the Labor Museum.