Elizabeth Nourse: Developing Connections

"The Sewing Lesson" by Elizabeth Nourse

"During the winter of 1895 Elizabeth Nourse painted a portrait of the sculptor Clement J. Barnhorn as a gift to her former Cincinnati classmate. Barnhorn had been awarded a scholarship for study abroad by the Cincinnati Art Academy and was to remain in Paris from 1895 to 1900, exhibiting at the New Salon with Nourse. He then returned home and executed many public commissions while teaching at the Cincinnati Art Academy and designing for the Rookwood Pottery. He became a well-known and beloved figure in the community and was extremely helpful to Nourse in publicizing her work locally. He also directed to her Paris studio many Cincinnatians who were traveling abroad. [He was also a good friend with Frank Duveneck and designed his memorial crypt at the Mother of God Cemetery.]

The following spring Nourse's five entries in the New Salon were well received, and the board voted to make her an associate member. [Her entries, which included "The First Communion," hung alongside paintings by such artists as Alfred Stevens, Frits Thaulow, Alfred Sisley, James Jebusa Shannon, Julius Rolshaven, Peder Severin Kroyer, and many more well-regarded painters.] As a result she found her work in demand at all of the international exhibitions and received invitations to show at the annual exhibitions of American paint in Chicago and Philadelphia, and at the Carnegie International Exhibition in Pittsburgh. Her work was shown in these cities, as it was in Cincinnati, almost every year until the onset of World War I in 1914. This exposure served to make her name known to the American public even though she did not return periodically to the United States, as many expatriate artists did."

To be continued 

 

(Excerpts from "Cincinnati Societaire" by Mary Alice Heekin Burke in "Elizabeth Nourse, 1859-1938: A Salon Career.")