The Red Rose Girls: Preparing for the Harrisburg Murals

 

"The Vision of St. Augustine" by Vittore Carpaccio

"In 1902, the state of Pennsylvania was engaged in building a new State Capitol building, to replace the previous edifice, destroyed in a disastrous fire. The architect saw it not only as a place to conduct the business of the commonwealth but also as a museum to applaud the history and contributions of the citizenry. When Violet Oakley's work was brought to his attention, he decided to take a chance on the talents of the young artist and commissioned her to paint eighteen murals for the Governor's Reception Room. Although the majority of the murals were assigned to the well-known illustrator and muralist Edwin Austin Abbey, the eighteen paintings for the Reception Room constituted a sizable task. It was the first time an American woman artist had received such a prestigious assignment. Violet was offered $20,000 for the project, which would take her four years to complete. She accepted $5,000 immediately as an advance against expenses. 

Never judicious with her money or adept at making long-range financial palns, the sum seemed inexhaustible to her. In preparation for the job, she sailed for England in March 1903, inviting her mother to accompany her. When she arrived in England, Violet set to work exhaustively researching the life of William Penn. She also spent time in London's museums and galleries and gained artistic inspiration from Pre-Raphaelite painters Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones.  During the summer of 1903, she traveled to Rome, Florence, Venice, Assisi, Perugia, and Siena, studying mural painting techniques and analyzing the works of the Italian masters. In Venice she discover the mural paintings of Carpaccio in the Church of San Giorgio degli Schivoni and found inspiration for her own project.

The trip was Violet's first time away from her friends in five years. As the weeks went on, she missed her companions and begged for some word but received nothing from them. The truth was that her fellow 'Red Roses' had not forgotten her, they were just occupied with their own work and the management of their extensive property. In September she concluded her studies and boarded the the Royal Mail Steamship 'Umbria' for the return voyage. She wrote her friends: 'I want every single one of you to be there - so please let me know... I wish I could be surprised by a line of Red Roses on the dock.'"

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: The "Cogs"

"The Red Roses: Elizabeth Shippen Green, Violet Oakley,
Jessie Willcox Smith and Henrietta Cozens

"As the ties between the women intensified, they began to refer to each other as sisters and to call each other by pet names. Jessie Smith became Jeddy, Elizabeth Green, Liddy, and Henrietta Cozens, Heddy. They tried out Viddy, for Violet, but somehow a diminutive did not mesh with her solemn personality and increasingly volatile temper. She preferred 'Violet, Duchess of Oaks.' The four women also chose a common surname, dubbing themselves the 'Cogs' family: 'C' for Cozens, 'O' for Oakley, 'G' for Green, and 'S' for Smith. Their teacher and mentor Howard Pyle called them the 'Red Rose Girls.'

1902 brought several honors to the household. The Plastic Club Exhibition Committee offered them a three-woman show. Jessie Smith managed to accumulate an impressive group of thirty illustrations. Advertising work for Procter & Gamble shared space with book illustrations, numerous magazine illustrations, and the designs for the Bryn Mawr calendar. Elizabeth Green contributed her calendar illustrations, as well as magazine illustrations. Violet Oakley exhibited two covers for 'Collier's Weekly,' some charcoal drawings, and her designs for the All Angels' stained-glass windows and chancel decorations. The show lasted from February third to the fifteenth and garnered favorable reviews from the local press, which noted that, even though they lived and worked together, the three friends maintained their artistic integrity. As noted: 'In illustration Miss Green shows possibly the most originality, Miss Smith the finest finish and Miss Oakley the strongest decorative sense.'

The success of the exhibition was an important step in the careers of all three artists, but it was the move to the Red Rose Inn that filled them with optimism. Photographs taken just prior to the move capture their high spirits. In one staged tableau, the four women sit around a table covered with beer mugs and wine bottles and hold up glasses filled with milk. In another the three artists, wearing the smocks they used for painting, are posed in front of Violet's poster design for the Plastic Club exhibition. Each grasps a long-stemmed red rose as Henrietta Cozens, holding a fourth rose, raises a watering can over her friends' heads."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.) 

 

The Red Rose Girls: Henrietta Cozens

"I Love the Cat" by Jessie Willcox Smith

"By the time Violet Oakley, Jessie Willcox Smith and Elizabeth Shippen Green were ready to relocate to the Red Rose Inn, the household had expanded to include their friend Henrietta Cozens. Although not an artist, Henrietta had agreed to shoulder the responsibility of managing the property and overseeing all domestic chores. Her compelling interest was in gardening. She had no career ambitions other than to fulfill the traditional expectations of a proper Victorian housewife, since she had no intention to marry (although she had, at one point, been engaged), and had decided to commit her time and energy to managing the household for her three friends. 

Henrietta was senior member of the group, forty-three years old. She was a small, sharp-featured, reclusive woman with a strong will and a dedication to proper decorum that made her an ideal companion for the thirty-nine-year-old Jessie. Effervescent Elizabeth and intense Violet were almost a generation younger. Jessie must have welcomed the presence of another mature woman who shared her sense of propriety. In the many letters written over the course of her lifetime there was not one hint of criticism but rather effusive compliments of her capabilities as a homemaker. Her presence at the inn made the collaboration function like a family and enabled the women to enjoy a gentrified life while maintaining a punishing work schedule.

Even with Henrietta's assistance the women needed household servants: a cook, a maid and workers to help in the extensive gardens. The rent at the Red Rose was $125 a month, household expenses - not counting the money they paid to have their washing done or the maid's wages - typically came to over $500 a month, plus each had agreed to subsidize a portion of Henrietta's rent, and each had the burden of her own business expenses. In addition, Violet planned to invite her mother to come and live at the inn, and Elizabeth had similar plans for both her aging parents. The women were savvy enough to anticipate the seriousness of these increased financial obligations. So just before the move they made a vow, a solemn agreement to stay together for life."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.) 

The Red Rose Girls: The Red Rose Inn

"The Red Rose" by Violet Oakley

"Philadelphia summers were notoriously unpleasant. The weather occasioned much misery, causing more than one resident to recall with irony William Penn's proud boast that his city lay 'six hundred miles nearer the sun' than England. The heat also caused Violet Oakley, Jessie Willcox Smith and Elizabeth Shippen Green to take their work and escape to the country.

One day, as summer was waning and their return to the city imminent, they drove out to Villanova to see the famous Red Rose Inn. The estate had been the subject of numerous newspaper articles centering around the plans of the owner, Frederick Phillips, to turn the property into an artists' colony by subdividing the more than eight-hundred-acre property, building new homes on these lots and then leasing them to creative people with few resources but refined taste who might then 'develop their talents amid the graceful surroundings of country life.' 

In spite of legal battles from family members and neighbors, Phillips' grand scheme was not completely thwarted. He opened the farmhouse to the public as the Red Rose Inn, planting a garden full of red roses and presenting one to each of his visitors when they signed the guest book. 

Eventually, he won his legal battles and was proceeding towards the establishment of his initial dream when his death halted all plans. His litigious relatives immediately put the Red Rose Inn, along with 205 acres of the property up for sale, so Violet, Elizabeth and Jessie made plans to tour the grounds before it was too late. After seeing it, Violet wrote: 'I knew at once that I had come home. This was it.'

Purchasing it was far beyond their means ($200,000), but they formulated a plan to rent the estate.  Elizabeth's cousin, who was a lawyer, approached the agent with their proposition, and in the spring of 1901, they leased the inn for a year and a half with the intent to extend if possible. Violet explained to the nearby residents, 'This is not going to be an artist's colony at all. We have grown tired of working in the midst of trolley cars, drays and heavy traffic, so we three are going out to where the green trees grow, where the cows roam and where the air is pure, and quietness prevails..."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.) 

The Red Rose Girls: Forward Together

 

Murals and Altarpiece by Violet Oakley
for All Angels Episcopal Church

"As Jessie Willcox, Elizabeth Green and Violet Oakley shared their triumphs and failures and the everyday pressures of meeting editors' demands and deadlines, their relationship with one another grew stronger. Their success forced them to make a decision about their lives. Howard Pyle had already made it clear to them that combining a career with marriage was not an option in an age when a woman was expected to manage a household, function as a hostess, and bear children - and Pyle's opinions were sacrosanct. The three friends chose to continue their careers in art.

Secure with their decision to dedicate their life to their art, the three women soared in their careers. Smith and Green, who were both still working for the 'Ladies' Home Journal,' soon had enough freelance work to enable them to quit their staff jobs. Green's pen-and-ink drawings appeared on magazine covers and accompanied short fiction. She also received her first encouraging international review from editor Charles Holme: 'Miss Elizabeth Shippen Green though a newcomer, draws with force and has a nice regard for the decorative effect of lines and black masses.' Jessie Smith illustrated several books, among them Nathaniel Hawthorne's 'Tales and Sketches' and 'Mosses from an Old Manse,' as well as numerous stories for 'Harper's Weekly, ' 'Scribner's,' and 'Harper's Bazaar.'

Violet Oakley's professional life also flourished. In addition to her illustration work, she experimented with designs for murals and stained glass. In 1900 she was chosen to paint two murals and create five stained-glass windows and an altarpiece in mosaic for All Angels' Church in New York City's Upper West Side. She was only twenty-six years old and intimidated by the task ahead of her. But it turned out to be a personal triumph for Violet. This project gave her the opportunity to create artwork that was more in tune with her emerging social conscience. Art, she wrote, could be a 'stimulus to civic righteousness.' The 'elevating influence of beautiful images' could have a positive effect on the community."

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Sharing a Studio

Jessie Willcox Smith illustration for
"The Emigrant East" for Scribner's

"The Oakley sisters' three-room skylit space on the third floor where the sisters lived and worked could easily accommodate another artist, so Jessie Willcox Smith was invited to move in. After Hester Oakley moved, out since writing had become the central focus of her career, Elizabeth Shippen Green and another of Pyle's students, Jessie Dodd, moved in.  The building had high ceilings and good light, and their sympathetic landlord, Clement C. Love, charged them only $18 each per month for the combined studio and living space. Because he was patient when they occasionally fell behind on the rent, they dubbed him 'Clemency Love' in honor of his benevolence.

The 'Evangeline' project had been a critical success and led to more assignments for Smith and Oakley. Among Smith's commissions in 1897 were several illustrations and two cover illustrations for 'Woman's Home Companion.' Violet garnered covers for 'The Century Magazine' and 'Collier's Illustrated Weekly.' Elizabeth Green made enough money to take a trip to Europe, and chaperoned by her mother, visited London, Brussels, Paris, Antwerp, and Amsterdam.

When she rejoined her friends in their studio, her energy proved contagious. The four young artists were anxious to expand their focus, to collaborate, and to continue their education, even though they had completed their schooling. In 1897 they had been presented with an opportunity to be part of a vibrant artistic community, becoming devoted charter members of the Plastic Club. 

The Plastic Club was the first successful woman's art organization in the country. At that time the world plastic referred to the fact that an unfinished work of art is always in a malleable, or plastic, state. Their gathering fostered a determination among the city's female artists to form a supportive organization through which women could combine artistic and social interests. There were informative lectures, weekly drawing classes, social events and parties, and most significantly a series of shows of the members' artwork."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Howard Pyle, Pt. 2

An illustration for "Evangeline: Tale of
Acadie" by Jessie Willcox Smith

"Howard Pyle counted Jessie Smith, Elizabeth Shippen Green and Violet Oakley among his top students and recommended Smith and Oakley for their first important commission, a series of illustrations for Longfellow's 'Evangeline,' which was published in 1897. He had noticed a similarity between the paintings of the two women that caused him to believe that a collaborative project would be successful. 

However, this equivalence in style was not unique to Jessie and Violet. Many of Pyle's women students worked together on their assignments and approached their paintings in a similar way. Their work was heavily influenced by French Art Nouveau design and illustration with its obvious Japanese influence - flowing feminine lines, floral ornamentation, and unexpected asymmetry. It has been noted that the work of Pyle's female students is much more consistent in style than the work of their male colleagues, a testament to the spirit of camaraderie that developed among the serious women students in the class.

The 'Evangeline' project began a friendship between Jessie and Violet that was to last a lifetime. They could not have been a more unlikely pair, but as they worked, Violet gained respect for Jessie's competence and experience as an illustrator, as well as her technical facility in painting acquired during her tenure at the Academy. Jessie was impressed with Violet too. The younger artist was sophisticated and urbane, with family connections in the art world and in European society - contacts that dazzled Jessie, whose own background was much less illustrious. 

They were both aware that the 'Evangeline' commission was an extraordinary professional opportunity for them. A book with color illustrations by a major author from a top publishing house could launch their careers. When they began their project in earnest, they spent as much time together as possible and showed each new production to their teacher. The process of working as a team was something new to them, but they found the collaboration helpful. Both of them felt that they were producing their best work, and they began to discuss sharing studio space."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.) 

The Red Rose Girls: Howard Pyle

Howard Pyle's students painting in Chadds Ford, 1899

"When Violet Oakley walked into Howard Pyle's illustration class in 1897, she noticed Jessie Smith immediately and was intimidated by her skill and confidence. 'Still a little afraid of you - as that first day in Howard Pyle's class!' she wrote to her friend thirty-three years later. Elizabeth Green was also in the group, although she made no immediate impression on Oakley. Like Smith, Green was a charter member of Pyle's first class and an established professional illustrator.

It is not surprising that when the Drexel Institute announced that Pyle would teach an illustration class, the course was immediately oversubscribed to be admitted. Howard Pyle began his teaching career at the age of forty-one, at a time when the high demand for magazine illustrations coincided with a decisive drop in their quality. He felt it was especially important that the artists who worked for publication have the most rigorous training possible. 

In the 1880s he produced a steady flow of work himself, countless illustrations for magazines and drawings for the books that he wrote as well as illustrated. In five years he had written and illustrated six books, and in the next eight years he produced more than one thousand illustrations for books and periodicals. Initially he was able to offer instruction only on Saturdays at 2:00 p.m. However, during the first two years his class was so successful that the president of Drexel persuaded him to extend his commitment to to teach two days a weeks, on Mondays and Fridays.

The rest of the week his students worked on their paintings at home. On the days when they did attend class, instruction began at nine o'clock in the morning with consultation and criticism, followed by life drawing. After lunch, courses in composition and practical illustration augmented the curriculum. In spite of this somewhat irregular schedule, Howard Pyle proved to be a charismatic, innovative instructor who treated everyone with patience and impartiality. He was an unselfish man, proud of his students' accomplishments. When any of them began to show professional promise, he was quick to recommend their work to the many distinguished art editors who trusted his judgment implicitly. Many of his best students began working professionally while still enrolled in his classes."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

 

The Red Rose Girls: Violet Oakley, Pt. 3

"The Virgin Mary," a study by Violet Oakley
for "The Redemption"

"When Arthur Oakley's health began to fail, the family's European idyll was cut short and they returned home. In later years Violet described his malady as a nervous breakdown brought on by financial reverses, anxiety and overwork. 

With her father's mounting medical expenses Violet and her sister Hester began to think seriously about practical careers. Hester focused her ambitions on writing, while Violet, still unsure of how she could translate her artistic ability into economic independence, took the train to Philadelphia to study with Cecilia Beaux, the first female instructor ever hired to teach at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. She enrolled in two courses: the portrait course taught by Beaux, 'Drawing and Painting from Head,' was the Academy's most expensive offering at $25 per term, and the slightly less expensive $20-per-term 'Day Life Drawing Class' with Joseph DeCamp. 

Hester's novel, 'As Having Nothing,' was progressing well but would not be published until 1898. In the interim she enrolled in Howard Pyle's 1897 illustration class at the Drexel Institute. Pyle was a writer as well as an illustrator, and Hester Oakley thought she might follow in his footsteps. She loved the class and raced home to her sister exclaiming, 'Violet, you must come too. He is simply wonderful!' Violet, who was struggling with the financial burdens of the Academy tuition heeded her advice and left the Academy after one semester. Because admission in Pyle's school was competitive, Violet prepared her portfolio carefully. She was elated when the famous artist looked at her work and told her, 'I think I can help you.' 

Anxious to secure a space where they could begin working in earnest, the two sisters rented a studio. In spite of the family's desperate financial problems, their mother sacrificed her own comfort and loaned her daughters enough family furniture to make the place livable. Violet was twenty-two when she moved into the new studio and began her training at Drexel. She was a slender young woman with voluminous dark hair, hazel eyes and an inclination to dress in shades of violet whenever possible. She was undeniably clever, but very shy and unsure of herself. She was never able to conquer her shyness."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Violet Oakley, Pt. 2

Violet Oakley

Study for "Abraham Lincoln
Delivering the Gettysburg Address"

"Violet Oakley grew up in Bergen Heights, New Jersey, the youngest of three sisters. Her mother had cast aside her own professional ambitions when she married, yet she encouraged all three of her daughters in art, and they spent many hours sketching. The young Violet had an eye for detail and was careful with her drawings. Although her early drawings were cheerful and unconstrained, her childhood was not entirely free from care. She suffered from both asthma and extreme shyness. 

When her older sister was sent to Vassar College, Violet stayed home, studiously copying the Old Master engravings that both her grandfathers had collected on their numerous trips to Europe. When she was twenty years old, her parents finally felt secure enough about her health and permitted her to begin her formal art education. She accompanied her father on the early train to New York City and attended classes at the Art Student's League, where she studied with Irving R. Wiles and Carroll Beckwith.

In the winter of 1895 Violet's family went to Europe to visit her Aunt Juliana's family in France. Violet and Hester seized the opportunity for art instruction. The sisters were admitted to the Académie Montparnasse to study with Edmond Aman-Jean and Raphael Nevin. The atelier was the typical all-female class: a mixture of the serious student and the dilettante, the ambitious and the merely bored. Violet plunged into her studies and was captivated by the Parisian aesthetic and the graceful paintings and posters of the Art Nouveau movement. That summer the sisters traveled to Rye, England, to take a class with Charles Lazar, the artist Violet credited for helping her conceptualize her paintings. 'Work it out alone,' Lazar told her. 'Work it out with yourself and Nature.'"

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Violet Oakley, Pt. 1

"Unity, a mural by Violet Oakley, installed at the
Pennsylvania State Capitol

Violet Oakley working on "Unity"

"Violet Oakley, the youngest of the 'Red Rose Girls,' was born in New York on June 10, 1874, into an artistic dynasty. Twelve of her ancestors were artists. She once described her own interest in the field as 'hereditary and chronic' and with rare humor remarked that she was born with a paintbrush in her mouth instead of a silver spoon. 

Her grandfather, George Oakley, maintained a keen interest in art and returned to Europe many times to copy the works of the Old Masters. He eventually taught himself to paint well enough to be elected an Associate of the National Academy of Design. He encouraged Violet's father, Arthur, to pursue a career in art, and although Arthur eventually established a career in business, he maintained an interest in painting.

Violet's maternal grandfather enjoyed a long, successful career as a professional artist and made his living as a portrait painter in Massachusetts, where he gained fame as 'The Gainsborough of Nantucket.' He was elected to the National Academy in 1836. Swain passed his ability on to his daughter Cornelia, Violet's mother. Cornelia Swain studied in Boston with William Morris Hunt. Two of Violet's aunts, Juliana and Isabel Oakley, also had artistic ambitions and studied in Europe, including studies in Munich with American painter Frank Duveneck. 

Violet was justifiably proud of her talented family. In her later years she made several starts at an autobiography but unfortunately never got past the table of contents and a few brief pages. Her first chapter, 'Goodly Heritage,' began with a quote from the Psalms of David: 'The lines are fallen unto me in Pleasant Places: Yea, I have a goodly heritage.'"

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Elizabeth Shippen Green, Pt. 2

"The Five Little Pigs" by
Elizabeth Shippen Green

"Elizabeth Shippen Green was an unusually ambitious and resourceful young woman. She learned the technical aspects of the illustration field from her father. At the age of seventeen she set up a studio in the corner of her bedroom, produced a series of drawings, and sold them to the 'Philadelphia Times.' These first published illustrations appeared in the 'Times' on her eighteenth birthday (one month before she began taking classes at the Academy), as an accompaniment for her own charmingly naive rhyme about a child and her doll, 'Naughty Lady Jane.'

The remuneration for these illustrations was hardly enough to earn Bessie Green financial independence (fifty cents for a one-column drawing, a dollar for two columns, and occasionally three dollars for a very large drawing), but the success of these illustrations led to other commissions for the publication, and the modest fees were enough to pay the $8-per-month tuition at the Academy. The young artist was so anxious to see her work in print that she willingly tested the stamina that would sustain her long professional life. While working diligently in the Academy's Antique class, seeking to gain her instructor's recommendation for promotion to the Women's Life class, she also produced a series of illustrations each week for the 'Philadelphia Times.'

Elizabeth also began to solicit new clients who would give her the opportunity to showcase more impressive drawings. Her first magazine cover was published in December 1890, two months into her second year at the Academy. She was nineteen years old. The drawing, executed in a sure and fluid line, appeared on the December cover of the humor magazine 'Jester' and depicted a young couple in evening dress at a holiday party. Her drawing, entitled 'Every Bud Has Its Thorn,' was captioned:

HE: I assure you, Miss Jacqueminot, I get thoroughly battled when I talk to a debutante, just lose my head completely y'know.
SHE: Indeed? What a pity. Well, Christmas is not far off, and perhaps Santa Claus will bring you some presents of mind.

She also established herself as a regular contributor to the 'Philadelphia Public Ledger.' Her assignments were all fashion illustrations: a corseted woman in a broad-shouldered gown that emphasized her tiny waist, a straw hat trimmed with Mercury wings. Although her drawings were competent, they were prosaic and virtually indistinguishable from those of the many other fashion illustrators plying their trade. She had yet to hit her stride."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Elizabeth Shippen Green, Pt. 1

"A Petal from the Rose" by Elizabeth Shippen Green

"Elizabeth Shippen Green was a graduate of the Pennsylvania Academy. Bessie, as she was known, was described by her friends as 'a delightful person, and full of fun, who didn't mind making herself look ridiculous.' Small, slim, dark-haired and bright-eyed behind her spectacles, she began her studies in 1889 and completed them in 1893.

She was the third child of Jasper and Elizabeth Boude Green, born in September on the first day, in 1871. Her sister Katherine was just a year older. The family home was near the heart of Philadelphia. They were not wealthy but they had impeccable old Philadelphia connections through both the Green and the Shippen families, which provided Elizabeth with entrée into the best social circles throughout her life.

Like most Victorian parents, it was important to Jasper and Elizabeth Green that their daughters have every possible social advantage. Elizabeth was sent to private Philadelphia schools. Her interest in art began at a very young age. Encouraged by her father, a former Academy student, woodcarver, and artist-correspondent for 'Harper's Weekly' during the Civil War, she began illustrating her school notebooks at the age of eight. Her parents allowed their talented young daughter to enroll at her father's alma mater when she was just eighteen.

Unlike Jessie Smith, Elizabeth Green never thought of pursuing a career in the fine arts. Her focus was always on illustration. It is often forgotten that in the last quarter of the nineteenth century illustrated books and periodicals were the only vehicle for bringing images of the world into American homes - that weekly magazines with serialized stories generated the same anticipation as a a favorite weekly television program. Since eighty-eight percent of all the subscribers to American periodicals were women, magazine editors actively sought out qualified artists who could delineate a feminine point of view - and there were few female artists skilled enough to complete the assignments. Elizabeth's father could see that she had talent and that the climate favored her success - so it was not surprising that he had high hopes for her future."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls: Art and Love on Philadelphia's Main Line" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Jessie Willcox Smith, Pt. 2

"Round the Ring of Roses" by Jessie Willcox Smith

"Jessie Willcox Smith was twenty-one years old when she enrolled at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women. The tuition was inexpensive, $100 for a term of five months, and the school was elegant. By 1884, it was housed in its sixth location, an impressive mansion that had been the home of the actor Edwin Forrest. Situated in a fashionable neighborhood, surrounded by gracious homes on large, well-tended lots, it was a beautiful setting for an inferior education.

But Jessie's patience with the structured and outdated method of teaching drawing from the flat did not last long, and although there would be significant changes for the better just a few years in the future, at that time the only new innovation was the hiring of a professor to teach a class in carpet and upholstery design. Jessie wanted more. She convinced her family to allow her to enroll at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where she came under the tutelage of the school's director, the notorious and volatile Thomas Eakins.  

Although Smith confided in her friends that she thought Eakins was a 'madman,' his classes improved her work. Under his tutelage she studied anatomy, perspective, and photography, yet she objected to his approach. Her own artistic vision, which was more romantic than realistic, never meshed with Eakins' insistence on rigorous confrontation with nature. She persisted in her studies at the Academy, working with Thomas Anshuntz and James B. Kelly, two of Eakins' former students who carried on the intent of the curriculum after his dismissal as director.

She never publicly discussed her presence at the school during this most turbulent time in the institution's distinguished history. Conflict of any kind caused her to feel profoundly uncomfortable. Her penchant for avoiding acrimony ruled her personal and professional life and manifested itself in her idealistic and often joyous paintings."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls" An Uncommon Story of Art and Love" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: Jessie Willcox Smith, Pt. 1

"Curly Locks" by Jessie Willcox Smith

"Jessie Willcox Smith was born in Philadelphia at a time when the city still retained much of its original charm, typified by tree-lined cobblestone streets and brick-walled gardens fragrant with the scent of the clematis flower. Jessie like to tell her friends that she was not born in the month of September, but in the month of Clematis, on the sixth day, in the year 1863. She was the fourth of four children and enjoyed a childhood of comfort, if not privilege. Her middle-class family managed to make ends meet but was never part of Philadelphia society, a closed circle that included only the descendants of the Colonial founders and the very wealthy. 

The Smiths were supportive of both their daughters. Jessie was sent to the Quaker Friends Central School in Philadelphia and then to Cincinnati, Ohio, to attend high school with her cousins. After graduation, she remained in Cincinnati. Because she had always loved children, she secured a job as a kindergarten teacher, trusting that a career in education would prove to be rewarding as well as somewhat profitable. It did not take her long to realize that she had no aptitude for her new vocation, and began to look for some other means of support.

One of her friends developed an interest in art and when she began to offer lessons, Jessie joined in as a student. It immediately became apparent that she had considerable talent. When her friend's mother, who was an artist, commented favorably on her drawings, Jessie abruptly changed her plans. Many years later she wrote about the accidental beginning of her auspicious career: 

'I knew I wanted to do something with children, but never thought of painting them, until an artist friend saw a sketch I had made and insisted I should stop teaching (at which I was an utter failure) and go to art school - which I did.'

She returned to Philadelphia, and on October 2, 1884 was admitted to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls" An Uncommon Story of Art and Love" by Alice A. Carter.)

The Red Rose Girls: The Academy Centennial

"Self-Portrait" by Violet Oakley

"Kept In" by Jessie Willcox Smith

"Giséle" by Elizabeth Shippen Green

"The date is Thursday, February 23, 1905. Teddy Roosevelt is about to be inaugurated for a second term. It costs $150 a year to attend Harvard University, a standard Oldsmobile Runabout may be purchased for $650 and a house for $2,000. Women will not vote in national elections for another fifteen years.

On this particular night Jessie Willcox Smith, Elizabeth Shippen Green, and Violet Oakley leave their communal residence for a banquet celebrating the centennial exhibition of the nation's oldest art institution, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Forty-one-year-old Jessie Smith, the oldest of the trio, approaches the evening with her status at the Academy already assured. At the 1903 exhibition she had garnered the institution's prestigious Mary Smith Prize for the best painting by a woman and is firmly established as one of the nation's foremost illustrators. Elizabeth Shippen Green, thirty-three, is also at the top of her career. The only woman under contract with 'Harper's' magazine, she will be awarded the 1905 Mary Smith Prize within the week. The youngest, thirty-year-old Violet Oakley, enjoys a national reputation as an illustrator and muralist.

Speeches are made, toasts given. The prizes are last, after coffee and cigars. Sculptor Alexander Calder is awarded the Lippincott Prize. The Temple Gold Medal goes to marine painter William Trost Richards. Then a surprise announcement: a special gold medal in honor of the Academy's centennial is awarded to the illustrator Violet Oakley. She is the youngest person ever to receive the award. The hall erupts in applause, and Violet is pelted with rose petals and carnation blossoms. Jessie and Elizabeth join the standing ovation.

After the banquet, the three women return in triumph to their leased estate in Villanova: the beautiful and elegant Red Rose Inn. Awaiting their arrival is the woman behind the women: the fourth member of the household, Henrietta Cozens. She was not a working artist, yet her assistance is invaluable. She manages the estate, tends the gardens, even knits the nightcaps. It was this unconventional living arrangement that freed Smith, Green and Oakley simultaneously from both the domestic responsibilities and the artistic isolation that still inhibit many capable artists. Together they are known as 'The Red Rose Girls.'"

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Red Rose Girls" An Uncommon Story of Art and Love" by Alice A. Carter.) 

William Rimmer: Conclusion

"The Dying Centaur" by William Rimmer

"In May, 1880, about half a year after William Rimmer's death, there was opening the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston an exhibition of one hundred and forty-six specimens of the doctor's paintings, drawings, and sculpture. Many thought that his drawings should become the property of the Museum; and an effort was made by those immediately connected with that institution to collect money for that purpose. Three hundred dollars were raised; the Museum, out of its scanty store, gave a like sum; and twelve of the artist's drawings were purchased. It is to be noted that the Japanese educators who were in Boston during the exhibition of Dr. Rimmer's works spent more time in examining them than in viewing anything else in the building."

The greatest impression one receives on reading the tributes to Dr. Rimmer, is that he was deeply appreciated for the lectures he gave and classes he taught on artistic anatomy, perhaps more than for his abilities, although at times extraordinary, for his art itself. Among the many who attended his talks were Frederic Edwin Church, Childe Hassam and Worthington Whittredge. Among the students in his classes were John La Farge, Daniel Chester French, Ellen Day Hale, and May Alcott Nieriker. One wrote:

'His teaching of figure drawing was something which could not be had even in Europe, and he was master of what he taught. What the A, B, C is to every grown person, anatomy was to him; and not only the structure of the human frame, and placing of muscles and tendons, but their position and change in motion. For any students who had their work at heart, his teaching was invaluable. We were always sorry to see the cloth wipe away a spirited drawing, and finally a few were photographed.'

The knowledge and inspiration he excited in each of them served as a stepping stone in their own art journeys, one that would aid in the creation of a beautiful future for art in America at the turn of the 20th century.

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.) 

 

 

William Rimmer: Final Years

"Flight and Pursuit" by William Rimmer

"When the School of Drawing and Painting was opened in the autumn of 1876, in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Dr. William Rimmer was engaged to take charge of the instruction in anatomy. He began his first course of lectures in January, 1877, in one of the rooms of the Institute of Technology, as those in the Museum were not read, and closed in the month of June.

The course consisted of two lectures a week, of an hour each, for which he received one thousand dollars. On the first day's lecture the doctor drew exercises on the blackboard; and the second the same exercises were drawn by the students, and were criticized by him and them. 

During the third school year, Dr. Rimmer added to his duties as a lecturer, that of instruction in anatomical modelling, to which he gave two mornings of each week, but he found it somewhat difficult to quickly fall into the plans of the school directors. At his age, and after his experience of independent action, conforming to the regulations of others was both onerous and annoying. 

Towards the end of the spring of 1879, his strength seemed suddenly to fail, and he at last reluctantly abandoned his classes six or eight weeks before the conclusion of his course. He thought that rest would soon rid him of the overpowering fatigue, but he never found strength again. His extreme nervous prostration continued to increase, accompanied by great physical distress, until the night of the 20th of August, he passed quietly away. His remains were laid in a little cemetery in East Milton."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.) 

William Rimmer and William Morris Hunt

"Anahita, Flight of Night" oil and chalk drawing for
Albany State Capitol murals by William Morris Hunt

The relationship between Dr. William Rimmer and William Morris Hunt, both influential artist/teachers in Boston from 1861-1879, was a varied one. Their personal relations were very friendly, but their approach to creating art not the same. Their temperaments, art spheres, and lives were as different as could be. Their methods of teaching conducted their pupils through different paths, although with the intention of arriving at the same goal. 

Rimmer taught that the constructive character of an object was the first thing to learn, and the acquisition of knowledge of the first importance, as the only means of expressing an art sentiment or idea correctly and successfully. The teaching of Hunt made the expression of the essential quality of an object as an artistic effect of the first importance, with the understanding that the knowledge of art, anatomy, perspective, and the rest would follow in the pupil's progress as a conscious necessity.

Like Rimmer, Hunt also had plans for a school of art; and he at length proposed to Dr. Rimmer, some years before he went to Cooper Union Institute, that together they should open such an institution, each giving instruction in whatever branches he felt his attainments best suited. Of this first proposal, however, nothing came. After the sculptor's return from New York in 1870, Mr. Hunt renewed his proposal; but Rimmer did not feel hopeful of its success. Beyond Mr. Hunt's ardent attempts to persuade Rimmer, nothing resulted, and it was soon forgotten. 

In the mid-1860s, Dr. Rimmer posed for the hands in Hunt's large portrait of Lincoln (which was burned in the great fire in Boston). Some years later when Hunt was considering the decoration of two large stone panels in the New York State Capitol, he thought that if he could secure the assistance of Dr. Rimmer and an architect in Boston, he should be able to finish the work in the required time. He visited Dr. Rimmer to consult about the project, inviting him to visit his studio to look over his sketches of the proposed paintings and criticize them.  Rimmer's conclusion after trying to do this was to tell Hunt that all he could do for him was simply to reproduce the designs after their composition had been definitely decided upon.

The artists parted with the conviction that there could be no community of art work between them. For the time that Dr. Rimmer spent in these conferences and visits, Mr. Hunt paid him one hundred dollars."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.) 

William Rimmer: His Boston Academy

"Master Builder" by William Rimmer

"The project of founding a school which should embody and carry into operation his principles and methods of art instruction had been the strongest desire of Dr. William Rimmer's life; and although with the failure of his plans at the Cooper Institute he seemed to abandon all hope of a full realization of this, he still made one more attempt in Boston.

He sent out the following circular to advertise [excerpted]:

'Dr. Rimmer, having withdrawn from the directorship of his School of Design in New York (an office held by him for the last four years), desires respectfully to inform his friends and the public, that he will resume his classes in Boston, at Hall No. 21 (for the present Wesleyan Association Building, Bromfield Street. Class days, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, from ten to twelve, A.M.

Dr. Rimmer solicits attention to the fact, that this is the only school in the country in which art anatomy in connection with sculpture and painting, and ethnology in its relations to art, are taught. In returning to Boston, he does so with the intention of making such a school as shall supply to the art student all that mere instruction can give.

Terms, ten dollars per month, payable in advance...'

Dr. Rimmer's class opened with twenty pupils; and from this time until its close, the autumn of 1876, the average attendance was about the same. Perhaps the most interesting experience of the artist in this connection was with his children's class. He was very fond of children. 'We live our lives over again in our children,' he wrote to his daughter, 'and must enter into all their joys and sorrows as our own.' His desire to start them correctly and intelligently in drawing and the practice of art shows one of his most delightful characteristics. Even in this class the doctor insisted upon the attempt to express an idea, in preference to exactitude in copying, and the doctor noted that the children were 'fairly wild with enthusiasm' with what they were learning to do under his instruction."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.) 

William Rimmer: Conflict at Cooper Union

"Evening, the Fall of Day" by William Rimmer

"Dr. William Rimmer remained in charge of the art department at Cooper Union until the close of the term ending June 1, 1870. For the first two years matters went on well, and the school assumed an importance perceptibly felt in the community, but during the last year or two it became evident to the trustees that still greater progress was necessary, and that the school must be re-organized.

There were two elements in Dr. Rimmer's system which must inevitably prove irreconcilable. These were the single personal government, as represented by its director, and the impossibility of his properly attending to the necessities of each pupil. It was also felt that he did not follow with sufficient care the original intention of the school, which was to instruct in industrial, rather than fine art. The young women were required to execute large and elaborate compositions in painting and sculpture, more from knowledge than from an intimate and constant reference to nature.

On Rimmer's return to the school in the autumn, to resume, as he thought, his old position, he found the re-organization of the school to be an accomplished fact. A lady had been appointed to take charge of the business portion of Dr. Rimmer's former duties, he being invited to the position of lecturer on anatomy and the principles of art. His work was to occupy two hours of each day, and his salary to be two thousand dollars a year. For this sum the doctor could not think of remaining in New York, and the offer was finally increased to three thousand dollars for three hours of daily work.

He tried to overlook what he considered a humiliation, and to consider favorably the offer of three thousand dollars. He also made an effort to secure pupils for a private class, that his income might be sufficient for the needs of his family. This last was, however, not practicable, and the first was impossible. His sensitive nature and his artistic pride had received too severe a shock. He declined the offer, and returned to Boston, where he began preparations for opening a private school."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.) 

William Rimmer: Cooper Union School of Design

View of an aisle in Cooper Union
School of Design for Women

"In 1866 Dr. Rimmer was invited by one of his pupils, a lady, to visit New York, and while there gave a lecture that greatly impressed those in attendance, including the Hon. Peter Cooper, the founder of the institute which bears his name. A movement was immediately inaugurated to induce Rimmer to come to New York as a lecturer and Mr. Cooper offered the use of a room in the institute, and Dr. Rimmer delivered a few lectures there.

These gave so much satisfaction that the trustees of the School of Design for Women, one of the art departments of the Cooper Institute, invited Dr. Rimmer to become its director and chief instructor. It was thought by the trustees that if a capable artist was placed at its head, with full power of direction and supervision, the success of the school would be more certain. Dr. Rimmer accepted the invitation at a salary of three thousand dollars a year, with the understanding that he should procure whatever assistance he might need in the way of instructors, and pay them out of this sum. He had at length an opportunity to carry out freely his ideas concerning art education.

The principal and philanthropic object of the school was the education of young women in the various industrial arts, in order that they might become self-supporting. The comprehensive and varied program he undertook to carry out in a school numbering from one hundred to two hundred pupils, without any professional assistance except that given by the more advanced students and those who were preparing to become teachers. The majority of the pupils were under twenty years of age. Some of them had followed their instructor from Boston, and there were constantly more applicants than could be accommodated. School hours were from 9 a.m. - 1 p.m. daily, Saturdays excepted, with an hour lecture from noon - 1 p.m.

The School of Design soon gained a worthy public distinction. Distinguished educators from different parts of this country and Europe visited it, and were warm in their praise of the great work it was accomplishing in art education. Its pupils went tot all parts of the country as teachers. Others became distinguished as artists. Every thing which the fertile brain of its director could imagine for the benefit of his classes was done. To all intents and purposes the school was his own, the pupils being to him as his own children, their success occupying all his thought."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.)

William Rimmer: Head of a Private Art School, Boston

"The Call to Arms" by William Rimmer

"The success of Dr. William Rimmer's lectures at the Lowell Institute had given rise to the hope that he might be permanently retained there, and a strong effort was made to secure the establishment of a school of art as a branch of the institution. This project failing, the male artists who had attended his lectures showed their grateful appreciation of his labors by the founding of a private art school, at the head of which he was placed. Col. E.C. Cabot, the architect, raised the sum of two thousand dollars with which to equip a schoolroom, and the following circular was issued on February 10, 1864.

'It is proposed to establish a school of drawing and modelling for artists and amateurs of both sexes, under the direction of Dr. William Rimmer.

There is now no place in New England where these studies can be pursued, and the talent which undoubtedly exists in the community either lies undeveloped, or exhibits a narrow and imperfect growth under imperfect discipline. Those persons who cannot avail themselves of foreign teaching are absolutely without the opportunities which experience has shown to be indispensable to a healthy school of art. To establish such a school, abundant facilities for study, both from life and from the antique, an organized system of classes and lectures, and eminent knowledge and skill on the part of the instructor, are essential requisites... This enterprise would not now be undertaken, were it not for the favorable opportunity which Dr. Rimmer's singular qualifications afford. It is believed by persons most competent to judge, that a better professor of anatomy in its relations to art does not exist. 

It is desirable, in order to facilitate the organization of the school, that persons wishing to join it should signify their intention to do so as soon as possible. This may be done, or further information obtained, by addressing a letter to Dr. Rimmer, at No. 54 Studio Building, Tremont Street, or by personal application to him there, between the hours of eleven and twelve any Monday, Wednesday, or Saturday.'

The school opened with thirty-nine pupils, and continued with varying fortunes until the spring of 1866, just two years later, when Dr. Rimmer moved to New York. It was his custom to give lectures on Saturday evening to those who were unable to pay the regular fees. He also taught many private pupils, his terms being a dollar an hour, and upon several occasions he lectured to Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney's ladies' class."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art Life of William Rimmer: Sculptor, Painter, and Physician" by Truman Howe Bartlett.)