She stands tall, dressed in black, her arms crossed, eyes focused on the photographer’s lens without hesitation. She seems strong minded and self-assured. In this scene, she is the only woman among a group of fourteen men, all of whom are artists and many of whom have become legends, including Barnett Newman, James Brooks, Mark Rothko, Richard Pousette-Dart, Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Willem de Kooning, Adolph Gottlieb, and Ad Reinhardt. In this context, these men are her peers. 

This is how we encounter Hedda Sterne in the famous photograph taken by Nina Leen in 1951 for LIFE magazine. It shows Sterne towering over the men - she had arrived late, the story goes, and Leen had asked her to stand on a table. Whatever the actual circumstance, it makes for an iconic depiction. Since then, this document has become a crucial footnote to the history of Abstract Expressionism. At the time the photograph was taken, Sterne was a mature artist. She was nearing forty, approaching the halfway point of her career. The picture shows her at the peek of her recognition. For the next six decades, she would accomplish much and create an extensive body of work. However, she would also always be referred to as the only woman in THAT picture. It was a blessing and a curse.

But who was Hedda Sterne before and after this brief moment? How to describe her work? Until recently, when one of her paintings was included in the Abstract Expressionism exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (October 3, 2010 – April 25, 2011), few remembered her name. When The New York Times published an extensive obituary on April 11, 2011, many of those who knew her were surprised to learn that she had still been alive. In fact, until her health declined in recent years, she had continued to paint. She was a gifted and unpredictable artist as well as a witness to a whole century.

Sterne was born Hedwig Lindenberg in Bucharest in 1910, the second child to Jewish parents. Her father, Simon Lindenberg, was a high school teacher, while her mother Eugenie cared for the home and children. From early on, Hedda and her older brother Edouard, who later became an acclaimed conductor in Paris, were raised with artistic values. The Surrealist artist Victor Brauner was a family friend, who further supported Sterne’s interest in the arts. After graduating high school in 1927, she began to attend art classes in Vienna and briefly studied philosophy and art history at the University of Bucharest. Equipped with a strong will and an independent mind, she soon opted to pursue her art training independently. To her, this meant travel. During the 1930s, she went to Greece, Egypt, and Paris. Beginning in 1930, she would visit Paris periodically and stay for several months, taking classes at Fernand Léger’s studio, as well as at the Académie de la Grand Chaumière.

At the age of twenty-two, she married her childhood friend Frederick Stern. In 1938, Victor Brauner encouraged her to show some of her collages in 11^th Exposition du Salon des Surindépendants, a Paris group show organized by Hans Arp. Sterne’s work from this time is characterized by compositional clarity, a sense of playfulness and the occasional touch of whimsy. Her collages frequently incorporate aerial views of cities, fragments of animals, and human features such as eyes. They translate as dreamscapes that are rich in abstract storylines. While reminiscent of Max Ernst’s collages or Alfred Otto Wolfgang Schulze’s (Wols) altered photographs, works that were shown in Paris's most prestigious galleries at the time, they reflect a distinct sensibility. Following her group show participation, Sterne’s affiliation with the Surrealists deepened. Upon Arp’s suggestion, Brauner introduced her to Peggy Guggenheim, who then presented Sterne’s work at her London gallery the following year.