[1] Around 1893 to 1894, her parents noticed her artistic abilities and sent her to study in Paris, France, where she frequented the Louvre, took lessons from Harry Thompson, and was first introduced to Impressionism.

[3] Bean opened her first art studio in 1906 in Washington, D.C., but it was a short-lived venture as she soon followed her family to New York, where her father had been offered a job as the state's head fish culturist.

[3] Bean moved to New York City around 1906, where she established a studio and studied at the National Academy of Design under prominent artist William Merritt Chase, as well as Robert Henri, Emil Carlsen, and Kenneth Hayes Miller.

[5][1][3] In the early 1910s, she traveled to Bermuda, where her family often visited, and met Mary Allen Hulbert Peck, Woodrow Wilson's rumored mistress, whom she would remain close friends to for the rest of her life.

[3] She also traveled to Europe to continue studying art in London, Holland, and Italy under painters including John Singer Sargent and Bernard Blommers.