Evelynne Mess Daily

Evelynne Bernloehr Mess Daily (January 8, 1903 – January 9, 2003) was an American etcher, printmaker, painter, illustrator, and art educator from Indianapolis, Indiana, who founded the Indiana Society of Printmakers in 1934. Along with her first husband and fellow artist, George Joseph Mess, she was active in the Indianapolis and Brown County, Indiana, arts community. Awarded an honorary doctor of philosophy degree from Colorado State Christian College in 1973, and a recipient of a Sagamore of the Wabash award in 1987, she was also a past president of the Indiana Federation of Art Clubs and a former secretary of the Indiana Artists Club. Her work is represented in several permanent collections that included the Library of Congress, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Indiana State Museum, the Indiana State Library, the Indiana University Art Museum, the Richmond Art Museum, DePauw University, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Early life and education Evelynne Charlien Bernloehr was born on January 8, 1903, in Indianapolis, Indiana, to John A. and Anna B. Bernloehr. John Bernloehr, a jeweler of German ancestry, was a partner with his brother in an Indianapolis jewelry business. Anna Bernloehr was a homemaker of Swiss heritage whose family operated a local bakery. John and Anna Bernloehr enjoyed music and the arts. The Bernloehr family included six children (three girls and three boys), two of whom died in childhood. Bernloehr's surviving siblings were Lenora, Wilmer, and John. As a member of a musical family, she learned to play piano and several stringed instruments, including banjo, mandolin, and guitar, but she developed a strong interest in drawing at an early age and aspired to become an artist.

Bernloehr attended Indianapolis's public schools. At the age of twelve she received a scholarship to join Indianapolis's John Herron Art Institute's Saturday-morning art classes for children. (The Herron Art Institute was a forerunner to the Indianapolis Museum of Art.) Bernloehr continued to attend weekend classes at Herron through her high school years at Indianapolis's Arsenal Technical High School, where she studied with illustrator Frederick Polley. She also studied for a year at Indianapolis's Shortridge High School from 1920 to 1921 before enrolling at Butler University, but left after a year to continue her studies at Herron. Bernloehr spent the next two years (1923–24) as a full-time student at Herron, where she studied under William Forsyth and Clifton Wheeler, and taught children's art classes in order to earn a teaching certificate in art. She also attended Wayman Adams School of Portrait Painting in New York, the Chicago Art Institute, and École des Beaux Arts.

Marriage and family Bernloehr met her first husband, George Joseph Mess, while assisting with evening art classes at the Herron in 1925. Mess was a commercial artist and one of the students in William Forsyth's drawing class. Bernloehr and Mess were married on April 28, 1925, at her family's home in Indianapolis. Following their marriage the couple set up an art studio in the living room of their home in suburban Broad Ripple. George Mess died in 1962, after suffering nearly two decades of ill health. The couple had no children.

“Marriage is wonderful if the persons involved are truly partners, especially if they work together in a field they both love, as George and I did,” Evelynne said of her husband, George. “We shared everything we did in art and complemented each other.”

Career After graduating from the Herron Institute of Art in 1924, Bernloehr took a job teaching art at Emmerich Manual High School in Indianapolis, but decided not to renew her teaching contract the following year. In order to maintain her contacts in the Indianapolis arts community, she assisted with the evening art classes at Herron. After her marriage to George Mess in 1925 she worked on her art in their home studio. It was unusual, in that time, for a woman to continue her career after marriage, but Evelynne Bernloehr Mess Daily loved her art too much to give it up.

Evelynne Bernloehr Mess Daily's artistic interest always lied with etching, inspired by the newspaper drawings of Frederick Polley, who taught her art at Arsenal Technical High School. At the time, however, there were no course offerings in etching. Bernloehr taught herself the art, learning from the pages of the Encyclopædia Britannica. Evelynne only taught during its first year of operation. Afterwards, she focused fulltime on etching and printmaking.

After the trip Mess resumed her work as an etcher and printmaker. During these early years she created etchings from many of the sketches she had made in Europe, although her preferred method was to draw designs directly onto copper plates and use fast-acting acids to score the freehand work. By 1932 she had introduced her husband, George, a trained painter, the medium of etching and taught him the basics of printmaking. She also worked as a substitute teacher at Indianapolis schools and during the 1930s became active in several art-related clubs.

Mess was a member of the Indiana Artists Club, the Indiana Federation of Art Clubs, and the art department of the Indianapolis Woman's Department Club, where she served for several years as chairwoman of its exhibits committee. She also took on leadership roles as a president of the Indiana Federation of Art Clubs and as secretary of the Indiana Artists Club. In addition, Mess became involved in the Hoosier Salon and the National Society of Arts and Letters, as well as the Brown County Art Gallery and the Brown County Art Guild.

In 1937 the Evelynne and George Mess moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he took a job supervising the reproduction of artwork for several magazines and she took classes at the Art Institute of Chicago. The couple returned to Indianapolis in 1940 after he was diagnosed with cancer.

To supplement their household income, Evelynne taught at Ladywood School in Indianapolis in 1942–43 and worked as a substitute teacher for the Indianapolis Public Schools. During the 1950s and 1960s she also taught at the Indianapolis Art League. George Mess, who suffered from cancer for more than twenty years, died from the illness on June 24, 1962. Overwhelmed with grief, Mess spent her first year of widowhood organizing a memorial exhibition of his art. Her remains are interred at Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis.

Evelynne Mess Daily and her first husband, George Joseph Mess, were well known in the Indianapolis and Brown County, Indiana, art communities. Recipient of a leadership award from the Indiana Federation of Art Clubs in 1978

At the Indianapolis Museum of Art: Old Montmartre, Paris (1929) Street Musicians in France (1929) Water Fantasy, Nymph (1931) Toadstools (1946) Barnyard Controversy (1949) Evelynne's Country Kitchen (1973)