[1][2] Born in Old Town, Maine, Svendsen pursued an undergraduate degree in art at Wellesley College and later completed her Ph.D. at Yale University with a dissertation on 19th-century American painter, John Vanderlyn.
[3][4] Her role was pivotal during the late 1950s as the museum prepared to move into its iconic Frank Lloyd Wright-designed building on Fifth Avenue.
[3] She organized notable retrospectives for artists such as Edvard Munch, Ilya Bolotowsky, Alberto Giacometti, and Paul Klee, and wrote extensively, including Klee at the Guggenheim (1977).
Upon retiring in 1982, she was named curator emeritus and spent her final years as a consultant at Sotheby's in the impressionist and modern paintings department.
[3][4] Ward Jackson, the Guggenheim's archivist, lauded her Yankee ingenuity, likening it to the legendary figures of Alfred Barr and Lloyd Goodrich.