I’m Liza Cowan. I started designing buttons and greeting cards back in the 1970's. My company was called White Mare, Inc. and was quite successful. I ended the business when I decided to go back to college and graduate school, to raise my daughters, and to focus on painting and photography (not all at once.)
In 2005, in Burlington, Vermont, I opened and ran an art gallery, Pine Street Art Works, featuring work by mid-career artists from around the US. In 2010, I opened Small Equals, which was a 90 sq. foot shop inside a collective studio/exhibition space. I focussed on selling very small, very cool products including custom-made wooden keepsake boxes. Both shops are now closed.
In the Fall of 2015, some of my old work found surprising fame when a photo I took in 1975 became the inspiration for the remake of the t-shirt "the future is female" by a small women-run California store . The photo, the shirt, and slogan became so wildly influential that they were written about in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Harper’s Bazaar, and many other US and European fashion magazines and blogs.
My painting, designs and photographs have been shown in galleries and a few museums around the US and abroad. Some of my design work was featured at The Museum Of The City Of New York in a 2016-2017 exhibition - and book - called Gay Gotham. The silkscreen poster, DYKE IS OUT, ARE YOU? was featured in that exhibition. One of my photographs is featured in the exhibition catalog for the show, Is Fashion Modern? at The Museum Of Modern Art in New York City.
