Boston mayor Marty Walsh has declared November 20, 2015, Corita Kent Day for the city of Boston, in honor of what would have been the late nun and artist’s 97th birthday, according to Harvard Art Museum’s Facebook page. “The proclamation is a reminder to Bostonians of the special individual that was Corita Kent and the impact that her legacy has had on generations,” the post explains.
Sister Mary Corita Kent was known for her messages of love and peace, popular during the social revolutions of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as her primary use of silkscreen. She is most famous for designing the image for the 1985 U.S. Postal Service stamp, “Love,” as well as “Rainbow Swash,” which covers a 150-foot gas tank in Dorchester, Massachusetts, and stands as the largest copyrighted artwork in the world. Kent worked between Los Angeles and Boston and taught at Immaculate Heart College in Los Feliz, California, where guest speakers and visitors included Alfred Hitchcock, John Cage, Saul Bass, Buckminster Fuller, and Charles and Ray Eames. Her work is included in the collections of both private collectors and institutions such as the Whitney Museum, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
In a clever bit of self-promotion, the post adds that the Harvard Art Museums is currently showing an exhibition titled “Corita Kent and the Language of Pop,” which will run until January 3, 2016, and then travel to the San Antonio Museum of Art, running February 13, 2016, through May 8 of the same year.