Born the son of a prominent musician, Ernest Leonard Blumenschein began his life with an emphasis on music. He attended the Cincinnati College of Music on a scholarship in 1891, and also began studies at the Cincinnati Art Academy during this time. He continued his exploration of both art and music when he went on to the Art Students League in New York, studying art and working as a symphonic violinist. In 1895, Blumenschein left the United States for Paris and began studies at the Julien Academy under the tutelage of Constant, Laurens, and Collin. During this time he befriended Joseph Henry Sharp who told Blumenschein and Bert Greer Phillips about Taos, New Mexico and its beauty. Upon their return to New York City, Blumenschein and Phillips shared a studio and Ernest began working as an illustrator. In the winter of 1898, McClure’s Magazine commissioned a Southwestern sketching trip for Blumenschein that sent him into New Mexico for the first time. He fell in love with the country and decided to remain there. That same year Blumenschein sent for his friend Phillips, and together they established the art colony of Taos. They were followed by Joseph Henry Sharp, Eanger Irving Couse, Oscar Edmund Berninghaus and Blumenschein’s pupil, W. Herbert Dunton. Although his heart belonged to the Southwest, Blumenschein continued to divide his time between Taos, New York, and Paris. He worked as an illustrator and taught at the Art Students League in New York, but it was in Paris where he met and married the established artist Mary Shepard Greene.

Blumenschein spent his summers sketching and painting in Taos where his works of the Indians of that area were stylized but still influenced by the realistic illustrations he did for books of Jack London and Booth Tarkington as well as Harper’s, Century, Scribner’s and several other noted magazines of the day. In 1919, Blumenschein moved his family to Taos and gave up his career as an illustrator to paint full-time. Aware of the modernists like Dasburg and Marin, he began paying more attention to complex compositions and free colors. The little Taos art colony thrived as did Blumenschein and the other artists living there, and their legacy remains a strong influence to this day. Blumenschein’s works are held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum, Museum of Modern Art, National Gallery of Art, Museum of New Mexico, Eiteljorg Collection, Anschutz collection, the permanent collection of the Harwood Foundation, and many important private collections throughout the world.

In 1833, at the age of 24, Swiss-born artist Karl Bodmer traveled 500 miles along the wild and untamed Missouri River with the German anthropologist Prince Maximilian. The small expedition spent an extraordinary year sketching, painting and writing about the daily life and ceremonies of the many diverse Plains Indian Tribes living along the Missouri.

On their return to Europe, the team spent the next few years turning Bodmer’s exquisite watercolors and Maximilian’s monumental narrative into a portfolio of aquatints and text to be translated into German, French and English. The portfolios were published in two versions, one a beautiful hand-colored set and the other in black and white.

Upon its publication, Europeans had their first real glimpse of the exotic peoples who inhabited the New World. In those images they saw the men and women of such tribes as Manadan, Cree, Sioux, Blackfoot, Minnataree, Assiniboin, and Gros Ventres in their precise tribal dress, in their huts, in battle, hunting buffalo or mourning their dead.

Today, the unprecedented work of Maximilian and Bodmer has become the most important documentation of an aboriginal people who would virtually disappear within a decade, due to alcohol, smallpox and the relentless western migration from the east.

Karl Bodmer’s original watercolors are now in the permanent collection of the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, Nebraska.

Like so many of the other female artists of the period, Ms. Phillips only used her initials to avoid discrimination. As scarce as biographical material can be on most of the nineteenth century artist, it is even harder to find on the female painters of the period.

What we have pieced together is this: M.V. Phillips, Artist, born in Ohio about 1848 and active in Cincinnati (Hamilton County) from 1880 or earlier, to at least 1905. After studying at the School of Design (now the Cincinnati Art Academy), she taught drawing and designing at the Cincinnati Wesleyan College for Women in 1882 and 1883. From 1892 until 1905 she was listed at various Cincinnati addresses as ‘artist’.

The frame, Dated 1879, was most likely carved by Jennie Phillips (artist sister). Jennie Phillips studied woodcarving at the School of Design (now the Cincinnati Art Academy) from 1874 to 1877. She exhibited a carved frame in the Women’s Pavilion at the 1876 Centennial Exposition. In 1878 Phillips carved the Gluck panel and a portion of moulding for Cincinnati’s Music Hall organ screen.

The principal art centers during this period were New York, Philadelphia, and Boston, but other cities throughout the country maintained vital artistic communities, usually supported by talented artists and avid collectors. Within the state of Ohio burgeoned a tremendous art market that saw its greatest activity in the Cincinnati region and engendered work from myriad talented artists, some local to the area, others just passing through for commissions.

Listed:

Artists in Ohio, 1787-1900

Hamiliton County census, 1900

Cincinnati Enquirer, June 10, 1880

Annual catalogues, Cincinnati Wesleyan College for Women

Exhibited:

Cincinnati, Ohio, Cincinnati Art Galleries, Panorama of Cincinnati Art III: 1850-1950, November 26 – December 31,1988.

Norton Bush was first noted for his portraits, marine views and landscapes of the East Coast and California. Later in his career, after visiting Central and South America, Bush devoted himself to his favorite topic, painting tropical scenery.

Norton Bush was born in Rochester, New York, Feb.22, 1834. He first studied art in his native city under James Harris. He studied with Jasper Cropsey after moving to New York City. He received criticism from Frederick Church who was already famous for his lush tropical scenes. It was Church who encouraged Bush to paint tropically.

In 1853, Bush came to California via the Isthmus of Panama and the Chagres River. He made San Francisco his permanent home. In 1868, he opened a studio in that city. During a visit to Panama in 1868, Bush obtained material for a series of landscapes he painted for the late William C. Ralston. These paintings were hung on the walls of the Sharon residence in Belmont, California. On a trip to Peru, where made sketches of Mount Chimborazo, Bush also crossed the Andes, drawing the famous El Miste, Mount Meiggs and other exotic scenes.

Bush was a frequent contributor to exhibitions held in San Francisco and at state fairs in Sacramento. He also exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1852 and in 1871. Elected a member of the San Francisco Art Association in 1874 and a director in 1878. Bush died in San Francisco in 1894.

Exhibited:
National Academy of Design 1852-1871
Mechanics Institute, 1858
California State fairs (four gold medals)

Museums:
Oakland Museum Society of California
Pioneers Crocker Museum, Sacramento

Paul Lewis Clemens (1911-1992) Portrait, figure, genre and garden painter; born in Superior, Wisconsin on Oct. 29, 1911.

Clemens studied at the University of Wisconsin with Oscar Hagen and the Art Institute of Chicago. He was based in Milwaukee when he exhibited on Treasure Island in 1939. He settled in Los Angeles about 1944 and remained until his death in Sherman Oaks on Aug. 20, 1992.

Exhibited:
Albright-Knox Art Gallery Art Institute of Chicago, 1936-38, 1939, 1941, 1943, 1945
Carnegie Institute, 1938, 1944-46
Golden Gate International Exhibition, 1939
Los Angeles Museum of Art, 1954 (Juror)
New York World’s Fair, 1939
National Academy of Design, 1942 (Altman prize), 1944 (prize), 1946
Milwaukee Art Institute, 1936-37 (prizes)
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, 1939, 1941
Wisconsin Salon of Art, Madison, WI, 1935-36 (prizes)
Whitney Museum of American Art 1938-40
Corcoran Gallery, 1939, 1943

Awards: Milwaukee Journal Prize, 1937 Work: United States War Department
Metropolitan Museum of Art
University of Nebraska
Milwaukee Art Institute
Los Angeles Museum of Art
Nelson Gallery
Clark Museum, Williamstown, MA
Butler Art Institute

Memberships:
American Federation of Arts; established 1909 to circulate exhibitions throughout the U.S. Published the Magazine of Art California Art Club; Established 1909 in Los Angeles by the painters club, exhibited at the Los Angeles Museum of Art from 1913-1938

Paul Desire Trouillebert, an almost exact contemporary of Stanislas Lepine (1835 1892) was with him the most distinguished of Camille Corot’s followers.

Trouillebert was born in Paris and studied under Jean Jalabert (b.1815) a painter of historical scenes, genre and portraits. He himself did battle scenes and portraits but was, and is, best known for his paintings of nudes and landscapes, a particularly notable nude being exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1882.

As a landscape painter Trouillebert owed much to Corot both in terms of subject matter, riverbanks and woodland and in terms of a silvery light, which frequently suffused his work. A painting in the collection of Alexander Dumas’ son was mistakenly taken to be a major work by Corot; such was the similarity of their work. However, Trouillebert was no mere Corot copyist, of which there were legion, his range was considerable from the silvery toned landscape with perhaps a solitary figure, to a broadly painted scene with vibrant forceful color.

Geographically, his range was extensive, subject matter including views of the Seine, Loire, Brittany, the Charantes and La Rochelle. Paul Desire Trouillebert was a popular, prolific and highly regarded artist in his lifetime, an indication of his reputation being that Edgar Degas, painter and a distinguished collector, was the owner of “Bords de la Seine”.

He was widely collected in his lifetime and has been throughout the 20th Century, the renowned U.S. industrialist Andrew Carnegie counting a landscape in his collection. His works can be found in museums in Le Puy; Mulhouse; Reims and Saumur.

Onderdonk, a painter best known for his landscapes of the Southwest, was born in San Antonio, Texas in 1882. As a child, Onderdonk exhibited artistic talent, and had voiced a desire to be an artist by the time he was five.

He received his earliest training from his artist father, Robert Jenkins Onderdonk. At age 18, he traveled to New York City to study at the Art Students League. There, he was a pupil of Kenyon Cox for one year, before attending William Merritt Chase’s Shinnecock Summer School of Art on Long Island. Instruction and criticism from Chase, who had also taught Onderdonk’s father, had a lasting impression on the young artist. At the end of the summer, Onderdonk had decided to attend Chase’s New York School of Art. He also studied with Frank Vincent Dumond and Robert Henri.

During his student years, Onderdonk painted prolifically to support his studies. By 1903, he had work accepted by the Society of American Artists. In 1906, he was hired by the Dallas State Fair Association to organize an art exhibit. Onderdonk continued working for the fair until his death in 1922. During the early part of the century Robert Julian Onderdonk was the most famous artist in Texas.

His style matured over the last fifteen years. He was a severe critic of his own work, and continually painted over earlier canvases that did not meet his exacting standards. By 1914, his panoramic vistas became popular with art collectors in Texas, New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles.

MEMBERSHIPS:
Allied Artists of America
Salmagundi Club
San Antonio Art League

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS:
Dallas Museum of Fine Arts
Fort Worth Art Association, Texas
Museum of Fine Arts of Houston
San Antonio Museum Association, Texas

Cook is a painter who is in love with painting, with the feel of paint, with its smell, with its application, with its color, with its movement on the canvas. His braodly painted landscapes, seascapes and urban images are affected by his unique American vision.

John Carleton Wiggins is known primarily as a landscapist who specialized in pastoral American Barbizon landscapes, usually with flocks of sheep or herds of cattle.

 

Carleton Wiggins, who preferred not to use his first name of John, was born in Turners (now Harriman), Orange County New York March 4, 1848.  He attended public schools in Brooklyn. In 1870, Wiggins began his formal art studies at the National Academy of Design under George Inness (1825-1894), a noted American landscape painter and later with Johann Hermann Carmiencke (1810 – 1867) in Brooklyn.

 

In 1880, Wiggins studied plein-air painting in France under the influence of the Barbizon School, and exhibited in 1881 in the Paris Salon.  He won a gold medal at the Paris Salon in 1894, and exhibited regularly at London’s Royal Academy.  He also studied in Holland.

 

His work was widely sought after upon his return to the United States.  In New York, he maintained a studio in Greenwich Village, and was influenced by John H. Cocks, a sculptor turned landscapist, and a resident of Brooklyn.

 

The inspiration for his paintings often came from the countryside of Old Lyme, Connecticut, a natural setting for the art colony there, whose work reflected the influence of the French Barbizon painters.  Carleton Wiggins was one of the original founders of the Old Lyme Art Colony, an early center of American Impressionism, and began an art school in that town.  His work reflects the influence from his studies with George Inness with the use of subtle lights and shadows, warm colors, and soft edges. A critic once said “His pictures have atmosphere and repose.”

 

Carlton Wiggins was elected as an Associate member of the National Academy in 1890 and made a full academician in 1906.  He was the father and grandfather of painters Guy C. Wiggins (1883-1962) and Guy A. Wiggins (1921- ). Carleton Wiggins died June 12, 1932, in Old Lyme, Connecticut, which at the time was his permanent residence.

 

Memberships:

American Federation of the Arts

American Watercolor Society

Artists’ Fund Society

Brooklyn Art Club

National Academy of Design

Salmagundi Club

Society of American Artists

Society of American Landscape Painters

Museums:

Chicago Art Institute

Brooklyn Museum

Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY

National Gallery of Art, NY

Newark Museum, New Jersey

Born on July 20, 1829 in Aix-la-Chapelle, Joseph Jansen spent most of his early years as a student at the Academy of Dusseldorf.  Jansen is known for his extensive landscapes depicting views of the Alps and of the scenery and towns along the Rhine and the Moselle.

 

His important canvases are often of a grand scale and combine many elements that are typically focal points for other, less important, works by the artist.  It was his ability to combine all the elements so convinc­ingly, that made him one of the better landscape artists of the period.

 

Jansen continued to capture the beautiful landscapes of his homeland on canvas throughout his lifetime.