Arche club

A Chicago women's club organized in 1888, it was dedicated to art education, which included lectures and annual exhibitions for local artists. The name came from the Greek word for 'beginning'. By 1894, five-hundred women belonged, and fund raising from the exhibitions was used for purchases of work by women artists for the collection of the Chicago Art Institute. Earliest purchases were seven plaster sculptures by Bessie Potter Vonnoh, which made Vonnoh the first female artist represented in the Institute's collection. Source: Julie Aronson, "Bessie Potter Vonnoh"