Cornelia Barns

American illustrator and cartoonist

Cornelia Baxter Barns (September 25, 1888 – November 4, 1941) was an American feminist, socialist, and political cartoonist.

Barns was born on September 25, 1888, in Flushing, New York, While living in New York, he also earned a reputation as author and poet. By 1910 the family relocated to Philadelphia, where her father established himself as theater manager, and Barns studied art.

As educational opportunities were made more available in the 19th century, women artists became part of professional enterprises, including founding their own art associations. Artwork made by women was considered to be inferior, and to help overcome that stereotype women became "increasingly vocal and confident" in promoting women's work, and thus became part of the emerging image of the educated, modern and freer "New Woman". Artists then, "played crucial roles in representing the New Woman, both by drawing images of the icon and exemplyfying this emerging type through their own lives."

In 1920 Cornelia Barns moved to California with her husband, Arthur Selwyn Garbett, Seeking job opportunities, the Garbetts next moved to Berkeley. Garbett became a radio station program director, He also served as music critic for a San Francisco newspaper. She contributed a feature column for Oakland Tribune, "My City Oakland". Garbett and Barns retired to Los Gatos, California, It was speculated that years of using etching acids on zinc plates in poorly ventilated studios had damaged her lungs. Others have noted that her paternal grandmother and grand aunt both succumbed to the disease. Following a flood in the family dwelling, few of her original artworks survive.