Abbey, Edwin Austin (01 April 1852–01 August 1911), artist, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of William Maxwell Abbey, a commercial broker, and Margery Ann Kiple. Abbey’s sole formal artistic training took place in 1868 at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he took night classes under ...
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Abbey, Edwin Austin (1852-1911), artist
N. Elizabeth Schlatter
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Addams, Charles Samuel (1912-1988), cartoonist
Robert C. Harvey
Addams, Charles Samuel (07 January 1912–29 September 1988), cartoonist, was born in Westfield, New Jersey, the son of Charles Huey Addams, the manager of a piano company, and Grace M. Spear. His father, who had studied to be an architect, encouraged young Charles to draw, and he did cartoons for the student paper at Westfield High School. Addams entered Colgate University in 1929 but transferred after a year to the University of Pennsylvania, which he left the following year (1931) to enroll in the Grand Central School of Art in New York, where he spent the next year (most of it, he once confessed, just “watching people” walk through Grand Central Terminal). Embarking on a career as an illustrator in 1932, Addams took a job as staff artist for a Macfadden true detective magazine, doing lettering, retouching of photographs, and diagrams of crime scenes for $15 a week. At the same time he started submitting cartoons to various magazines, selling his first in 1933. Soon thereafter, he was selling regularly enough to quit his job at Macfadden (“the last and only job I ever had,” he said) to earn his livelihood entirely as a freelance cartoonist....
Article
Albers, Josef (1888-1976), painter, designer, and educator
Brenda Danilowitz
Albers, Josef (19 March 1888–25 March 1976), painter, designer, and educator, was born in Bottrop, Germany, the son of Lorenz Albers, a house painter and craftsman, and Magdalena Schumacher. He graduated in 1908 from the teachers’ college in Büren and went on to teach in public schools in Bottrop and neighboring Westphalian towns. In the summer of 1908 he traveled to Munich to view modern art in the galleries and the historical collections of the Pinakothek. Albers’s earliest known drawing, ...
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Albright, Ivan (1897-1983), artist
David Detmer
Albright, Ivan (20 February 1897–18 November 1983), artist, was born in North Harvey, Illinois, the son of Adam Emory Albright, an and Clara Wilson. His involvement in art began almost in infancy, as he and his identical twin brother, Malvin (who also became a professional artist), spent countless hours in early childhood posing for their father’s paintings. At the age of eight the twins began to receive instruction in drawing from their father. Ivan showed considerable skill in detailed drafting, and on graduating from high school in 1915 he decided that his skills might best be put to use in architecture. Toward that end he enrolled for a year of study of architecture at Northwestern University, followed immediately by an additional year at the University of Illinois....
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Alexander, Francis (1800-1880), artist
David Meschutt
Alexander, Francis (03 February 1800–17 March 1880), artist, was born in Killingly, Connecticut. His parents’ names are unknown. As a child he worked on the family’s small farm and attended a local school. When he was seventeen he began teaching at that same school. He liked to sketch birds and other objects from nature and when he was twenty painted watercolors of fish he had caught. The pictures drew much praise from family and friends. As a result he decided to pursue a career as a painter, primarily, as he later wrote to ...
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Alexander, John White (1856-1915), artist
Martin R. Kalfatovic
Alexander, John White (07 October 1856–31 May 1915), artist, was born in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, the son of John Alexander and Fanny Smith. Alexander’s father died soon after his birth, and his mother died when he was five years old. Sent to live with his maternal grandparents, Alexander left school at the age of twelve to work as a messenger for the Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph Company in Pittsburgh. Colonel Edward Jay Allen, an official of the firm, was impressed by a sketch done by Alexander. Allen eventually adopted Alexander....
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Allston, Washington (1779-1843), painter
A. Kristen Foster
Allston, Washington (05 November 1779–09 July 1843), painter, was born in Georgetown, South Carolina, the son of Captain William Allston, who served under General Francis Marion during the American Revolution, and Rachel Moore. After his father’s death in 1781, his mother married Dr. Henry Collins Flagg of Newport, Rhode Island, who had come south in his position as chief of General ...
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Ames, Blanche Ames (18 February 1878–01 March 1969), artist and women's rights activist
Jacqueline Van Voris
Ames, Blanche Ames (18 February 1878–01 March 1969), artist and women's rights activist, artist and women’s rights activist, was born in Lowell, Massachusetts, the daughter of Adelbert Ames, a Civil War general and governor of Mississippi during Reconstruction, and Blanche Butler, whose father was a general and governor of Massachusetts. The younger Blanche graduated from Smith College in 1899 with diplomas from both the College and the School of Art....
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Ames, Ezra (1768-1836), painter, engraver, and gilder
Anne Hirshorn
Ames, Ezra (05 May 1768–23 February 1836), painter, engraver, and gilder, was born Ezra Emes in Framingham, Massachusetts, the son of Jesse Emes, a soldier and farmer, and Betty Bent. Ames’s mother died when he was seven. Nothing is known of his education; he may have been educated at home. In 1790 his father, who had remarried, moved the family to Staatsburg, New York. By that time Ezra had chosen to spell his surname Ames and was working as a journeyman painter and craftsman in Worcester, Massachusetts. In 1793 he settled in Albany, New York, which was his home for the rest of his life. In October 1794 he married Zipporah Wood of Uxbridge, Massachusetts, and returned with her to Albany, where their three children were born....
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Anderson, Alexander (1775-1870), engraver
Jane R. Pomeroy
Anderson, Alexander (21 April 1775–17 January 1870), engraver, was born in New York city, the son of John Anderson, a printer and publisher, and Sarah Lockwood. By 1790 the Andersons were living on Wall Street; they were Episcopalians, of moderate means, with varied interests and social contacts. The family was close-knit and affectionate....
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Anderson, Carl (1865-1948), cartoonist
Dennis Wepman
Anderson, Carl (14 February 1865–04 November 1948), cartoonist, was born Carl Thomas Anderson in Madison, Wisconsin, the son of Andrew Anderson, a Norwegian-born carpenter, and Mary Eid. He attended elementary school in Janesville, Wisconsin, and in Beatrice, Nebraska, but left school early to travel, supporting himself at his father's trade. A skillful workman, he patented a folding desk that was still being manufactured at the end of his life. Anderson had enjoyed drawing since his early childhood, and, as newspapers were beginning to hire artists to do pen and ink drawings, he decided to enter the field. He studied at the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Arts in Philadelphia from 1892 to 1895, and from about 1894 worked as a fashion artist for the ...
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Anshutz, Thomas Pollock (1851-1912)
In
Thomas Pollock Anshutz. Bronze bas relief, 1912-1916, by Adam Pietz. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.
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Anshutz, Thomas Pollock (1851-1912), artist and art teacher
Randall C. Griffin
Anshutz, Thomas Pollock (05 October 1851–16 June 1912), artist and art teacher, was born in Newport, Kentucky, the son of Jacob Anshutz and Jane Abigail Pollock. Very little information survives about his parents or his youth, though he seems to have received an early education in Newport. In 1871 Anshutz moved to Brooklyn, New York, to study art. There he lived with an uncle who had been favorably impressed by the young man’s drawings of boats on the Ohio River. Enrolling in 1873 at the prestigious National Academy of Design in New York City, Anshutz took cast- and life-drawing classes, principally with Lemuel Everett Wilmarth....
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Appleton, Thomas Gold (1812-1884), writer and artist
Vincent Freimarck
Appleton, Thomas Gold (31 March 1812–17 April 1884), writer and artist, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Nathan Appleton, a merchant, and Maria Theresa Gold. Nathan Appleton, whose family had settled in New England in 1635, helped develop Lowell, Massachusetts, into an industrial center and amassed a fortune that made it possible for Thomas to pursue his interests freely. After a year at the Boston Latin School and three at the Round Hill School conducted by Joseph Green Cogswell and ...
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Aragón, José Rafael (1796-1862), religious artist
Lonn Taylor
Aragón, José Rafael (1796–1862), religious artist, was the son of Juan Andres Aragón and Juana Dominguez Mascareñas. His birthplace is unknown, but in 1815, when he married María Josefa Lucero, he was living in the barrio of San Francisco in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He was still living there in 1833, when he described himself as an ...
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Arno, Peter (1904-1968), cartoonist
Robert C. Harvey
Arno, Peter (08 January 1904–22 February 1968), cartoonist, was born Curtis Arnoux Peters, Jr., in New York City, the son of Curtis Arnoux Peters, a New York Supreme Court justice, and Edith Theresa Haynes. As scion of a prominent family, Curt (as he was called then) was sent to Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut, and then to Yale College, where he indulged his interest in music and art instead of preparing for the career as a banker or a lawyer that his father planned for him. He drew cartoons for the ...
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Arriola, Gustavo Montano (1917-2008), cartoonist
Robert C. Harvey
Arriola, Gustavo Montano (17 July 1917–02 February 2008), cartoonist, was born in Florence, Arizona, the son of Aquiles Arriola, a general store owner who had come to the United States in 1894 from the hacienda of Espiritu Arriola in Hermosillo, Sonara, Mexico, and Petra Montano. The Arriolas moved in 1925 to Los Angeles, and Gus attended Manual Arts High School, where he took art courses and drew cartoons for the school newspaper. After graduating in 1935, he enrolled in an animation course and subsequently found a job with the Charles Mintz Studio. In August 1937 he went to work for MGM, starting as an inbetweener, a person who draws frames connecting action in animation, and ultimately joined the story department as a sketchman, visualizing elements of an animated cartoon as the writers talked through the plot....
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Ashley, Clifford Warren (1881-1947), artist and author
Elton W. Hall
Ashley, Clifford Warren (18 December 1881–18 September 1947), artist and author, was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the son of A. (which stood for Abiel) Davis Ashley, a grocer, and Caroline Morse. As a youth, growing up in New Bedford, Ashley witnessed the long decline of the once prosperous whale fishery that had brought fame and great fortune to New Bedford before the Civil War. The waterfront, with its wharves, derelict hulks, support facilities, and few remaining active vessels became his favorite playground and made a lasting impression on him. While a student at New Bedford High School, Ashley took an interest in art, which he subsequently pursued in Boston at the Eric Pape School. During the summer of 1901 he and his friends ...
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Audubon, John James (1785-1851)
In
John James Audubon. Lithograph in Gallery of Illustrious Americans, 1850. Courtesy of the Library of Congress (LC-USZ62-28111).
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Audubon, John James (1785-1851), naturalist and artist
Keir B. Sterling
Audubon, John James (26 April 1785–27 January 1851), naturalist and artist, was born Jean Rabin Fougère in Les Cayes, Santo Domingo, the son of Captain Jean Audubon, a French sea captain, planter, and slave dealer, and Jeanne Rabin (or Rabine), a young Frenchwoman employed as a chambermaid on the island. The traditional view, that Mlle Rabin was a Creole woman native to Santo Domingo, has been disproved. Audubon’s mother died before he was seven months old, and the child was cared for by another mistress of the father’s with whom he had several children. In 1791, fearing worsening conditions in Santo Domingo, Captain Audubon arranged for his son and a younger daughter by his mistress Catherine “Sanitte” Bouffard to be taken to France. There both were well cared for by Captain Audubon’s legal spouse, Anne Moynet Audubon, who had no children of her own. Both children were formally adopted by the couple in 1794, as was required if they were legally to inherit Captain Audubon’s name and property, and were baptized in 1800. At this time the boy received the name Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon....
