Local figure
Ruth Faison Shaw, the teacher who developed finger painting, retired to Chapel Hill, where she researched the use of finger painting in psychiatric therapy at North Carolina Memorial Hospital’s Department of Psychiatry. She had earlier taught in Rome and run the Shaw Finger Paint Studio in New York.
Source: UNC Libraries: Ruth Faison Shaw Papers, 1908-1968 (finding aid)
1887–1969 · Dates from the Library of Congress · On the Friends’ Local Authors roster → · Library of Congress authority record ↗
5 works about Ruth Faison Shaw are indexed here, as is one work by Shaw.
Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 2 dated events in the chronology →
Works about or by Ruth Faison Shaw. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it. Background reading appears below.
Art therapy runs through the papers of Ruth Faison Shaw (1887-1969), approximately 11,300 items in twenty four linear feet dated 1908 to 1968, part of the Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 3835. Photographs are noted as a form. Topics include art therapy for children and for veterans, women artists and women travelers, France during the First World War, Rome, New York and Chapel Hill.
Ruth Faison Shaw, credited with creating finger painting as an art form, is the subject of the exhibit pictured here at the Chapel Hill Museum. Taken on 30 May 2002 for the North Carolina ECHO project.
Included because: Their name appears in the record.
NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
Papers of the Denmark family, 1861 to 1966, gathered by Leonidas Polk Denmark (1892 to 1964), grandson of the farm leader Colonel Leonidas Lafayette Polk (1837 to 1892). They cover Polk's agricultural journalism, the Farmers' Alliance and Populist politics, the Civil War, World War I and the 1918 influenza. Hillsborough appears among the places.
Included because: Their name appears in the record.
Ruth Faison Shaw, known for developing finger painting as a teaching method, is documented in material she produced, newspaper clippings and photocopies, promotional pieces, a report with notes, and documentation from the Chapel Hill Museum. Chapel Hill Historical Society Vertical File Collection, Individuals and Families series, box 7. Undated.
Included because: Its title names this person.
Ruth Faison Shaw at work fingerpainting, in an undated candid photograph from the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection. Shaw is credited with developing finger painting as a method of teaching children.
Included because: Its title names this person.
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Catalog searches use the Library of Congress name heading: Shaw, Ruth Faison, 1887-1969. Historical-record searches use the person’s name and may include namesakes. Links open in a new tab.
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Picture: Ruth Faison Shaw, 1947. Public domain. By Ruth Faison Shaw; Shaw, Ruth Faison (1947) Finger-Painting and How I Do It, Leland-Brent Pub. Co., p. 5 OCLC: 1438717.; via Wikimedia Commons
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