Alice Crawford

Alice Crawford (American, 1929-2010) Collection available at the Michigan Art Gallery.

Alice Crawford, born in 1929, was a Michigan artist, muralist, set designer and teacher. Known as Ann Arbor’s best set designer, Crawford attended Oberlin College from 1946-1949 before transferring to Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, where she received her BA in art. She joined the Ann Arbor Civic Theater in 1953 and by 1969 she had designed over 30 theater sets for ACCT, winning awards for “Kiss Me Kate” (1965-1966) and “Finian’s Rainbow” (1968). In the 1950s and 1960s she also designed sets for the University of Michigan, Drama Season, Ann Arbor Recreation Department and the Ypsi Players. In addition to designing sets, she simultaneously lectured at Huron High School, taught art at the YMCA and at the National Music Camp at Interlochen.

Crawford’s painting studio was located on the second floor of the Hutzel building in Ann Arbor, Michigan. There she executed her distinctive oils, watercolors and drawings that were exhibited nationally in Michigan, Ohio, New York, Washington DC, Indiana, and Pennsylvania. She was internationally exhibited in Paris, France and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She was represented by The Lantern Gallery in Ann Arbor, two galleries in Detroit and one in Kalamazoo.

Crawfords paintings were regarded for their Muralistic representational quality, which is enriched with an expressive intimacy not found in her set designs.

“Painting is my own thing. To communicate with people, I do sets and teach.”

-Ann Arbor News, March 2nd 1969

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