Howard Pyle: His Own School

"The Old Violin" by Howard Pyle

"By March 17, 1900, Howard Pyle had made plans to open his own school in Wilmington. He described his goals in a letter:

'My final aim in teaching will not be essentially the production of illustrators of books, but rather the production of painters of pictures. For I believe that the painters of true American art are yet to be produced. Such men as Winslow Homer and [George] Fuller in figure painting, and a group of landscape painters headed by George Inness as yet are almost the only occupants of the field. To this end I regard magazine and book illustration as a ground from which to produce painters. 

My plan of teaching is somewhat as follows: the students who come to me will be supposed to have studied drawing and painting as taught in the schools. My first object shall be to teach them to paint the draped and costumed model so that it shall possess the essentials of a practical picture. To teach this requires considerable knowledge not usually possessed by the artist-teachers in the schools. This knowledge I feel myself competent to impart. I believe I am not devoid of a sense of color, and I trust I will be able so to instruct the people as to preserve whatever color talent he may possess. My experience is that within a year of such teaching, the people will be sufficiently grounded in a practical knowledge of painting to be able to embark upon illustrative work.

I shall make it a requisite that the pupils whom I choose shall possess, first of all, imagination; secondly, artistic ability; thirdly, color and drawing; and I shall probably not accept in any who are deficient in any one of these three requisites. My instruction would embrace not only daily criticism of the work done in class, but also instruction in composition, facial and figure construction, perspective, and proportion. I shall give lectures perhaps twice a week in the evenings.'

The school was accordingly founded. Nearly all of the first members were from the old class at the Drexel Institute, but as people heard of the new idea, there began to be applications for admission from all over the United States. In 1903, there were between two and three hundred such applications, but only three of the aspirants were admitted. Howard Pyle used the utmost discrimination in making his choices."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Howard Pyle, A Chronicle" by Charles D. Abbott.)