An unspoiled coastline bathed in spectacular light—just
far enough from Manhattan bustle—made the Hamptons seductive
for generations of creative types. Hamptons Bohemia: Two Centuries
of Artists and Writers on the Beach is an entertaining survey
of the personalities who found a summer or year-round haven
on the southeastern end of Long Island. Numerous color photographs—of
artworks, personalities, and landscape views—offer inviting
glimpses of the shifting tides of culture. The story begins
with early 19th-century figures like James Fenimore Cooper,
who abandoned a failing whaling business to take up writing
novels. Then came the genteel landscape painters with their
portable easels and sunshades. By the 1950s (the era of Jackson
Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Frank O'Hara, John Ashbery, and
many others), bohemia was in full swing. Since then the Hamptons
have become a clubby getaway for artists who've already made
it, from Kurt Vonnegut to Julian Schnabel. —Cathy Curtis
Carmel, California, has always been a community of artists,
writers, and freethinkers. During the early part of its rich
history, the area was home to Robinson Jeffers, Mary Austin,
Ansel Adams, Charles Greene, Jack London, George Sterling, Upton
Sinclair, and Henry Miller, among other great artists of the
twentieth century. During the late 1980s, actor Clint Eastwood,
a longtime resident, served as mayor.
While much about Carmel has changed since the days when Robinson
Jeffers could be seen strolling the beach, the area remains
one of America's most beautiful. It is also home to many of
America's most charming but rarely seen cottages. In Carmel's
residential district—a very private, heavily wooded area
surrounding the shops and tourist attractions of the town's
often busy main street—there are no sidewalks or streetlights.
The U.S. Postal Service does not offer mail delivery. Homes
have no addresses; they are simply known by name. Here, it is
not uncommon for tourists, so intrigued by the uniqueness of
the local architecture, to climb the fences of private homes
in order to get a closer look or snapshot of the house on the
other side. Now, for the first time, 34 of these homes can be
seen more advantageously, in more than 270 specially commissioned
and archival exterior and interior photographs.
Much has changed since the previous turn of the century, but
our appreciation of the restrained and peaceful beauty of Cornish,
New Hampshire has remained. In the early 1900s, Cornish was
renowned as an artist's colony filled with magical gardens that
appeared in the work of many resident artists like Frances Houston,
William Hyde, Maria Oakey Dewing, and Stephen and Maxfield Parrish.
In many cases, the fame of the gardens outlasted the reputation
of the artist, but in A Place of Beauty, the art and the gardens
that provided inspiration are seen as inseparable.
Garden admirers will enjoy this book as much as any art historian.
Twelve different houses are discussed in detail--the owners,
architects, gardeners, and their stylistic goals are revealed
through fascinating text, historical photographs, and reproductions
of the works of art that were created by the talented residents.
Between painting, sculpting, and writing, Cornish's residents
also found time to be surprisingly competitive in the realm
of gardening. While each house maintained a clear style, the
overall beauty was discussed and judged with a fairly critical
eye, and professional designers such as Ellen Shipman were brought
in for expert consultations. As one visitor said, "They
bore me to death with their houses and their poor little flower
beds." The text is filled with personal notes, diary entries,
and letters—the Cornish residents were a prolific lot.
And while the community was described by one female citizen
as "a place where men are acknowledged to be more important
than the women," the numerous photos and reproductions
of paintings that fill the book show a world filled with an
astonishing beauty rarely seen in our modern world. —Jill
Lightner
Americans in Paris 1850–1910 represents the profound
French influence—both in style and subject—on
American painters following the Civil War. There was a great
deal of French art in America, mainly in the hands of urban
industrialists and financiers eager to display their wealth.
Meanwhile, American artists traveled to France to study under
the masters, either at the École des Beaux-Arts or at
one of the independent academies or studios. Paris proved immensely
appealing as a locale in which artists were supported and valued,
cultural life was rich, the surrounding countryside ispiring,
and the cost of living relatively low. The landscapes and human
figures favored by French painters offered a nostalgic appeal
that American artists translated into a national vernacular.
Alternating beautiful color plates of some of the most influential
artists from America and France—among them, James McNeill
Whistler, Kenyon Cox, Mary Cassatt, Camille Cordot, and Honoré
Daumier—with informative essays describing biographical,
historical, and stylistic influences, this volume brings to
life this pivotal and creatively vibrant moment in art history.
New
Hampshire's Cornish Colony by Fern K. Meyers, James
B. Atkinson – Paperback: 128 pages Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
(April 27, 2005)
New Hampshire’s Cornish Colony illustrates this distinguished
American art colony. First settled in 1885 by colleagues of America’s
Michelangelo, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, the Cornish Colony was a retreat
for sculptors, painters, writers, and musicians. They were attracted
to this peaceful valley nestled in the New Hampshire hills in the
shadow of Vermont’s Mount Ascutney. Known as “the Athens
of America,” the Cornish Colony was a lively, glamorous society
during its heyday from 1885 to 1925. One outstanding member, the
famous artist Maxfield Parrish, was called a “chickadee”
because he spent the entire year in Cornish, not merely the summer.
In New Hampshire’s Cornish Colony, discover a portrait of the
colonists’ society and the fascinating people who contributed
to America’s cultural legacy.
Some of America's most influential artists of the late 19th
and early 20th centuries are featured, along with a concise
overview of the colonies in which they worked. These colonies
ranged from Carmel-Monterey in California to Gloucester-Rockport
in Massachusetts to Taos and Santa Fe in New Mexico. Some of
the artists are famous today, such as Georgia O'Keeffe, while
others were well known at the time and added to the name recognition
of their particular colonies. Scholars, students, and anyone
interested in American Art History will find valuable information
on how the closeness of colonies can affect and influence artists.
For most artists, interest in art colonies began in the mid-1800s
in Europe, where they had gone to live, work, and study. On
returning to America, they continued what they believed was
a practice that benefited their personal maturity as professional
artists--living in a major city such as New York during the
winter and spending summers with other working artists in art
colonies. The impact of those early artists can be seen in the
paintings of many of today's artists.
Why did thousands of nineteenth-century artists leave the established
urban centers of culture to live and work in the countryside?
By 1900, there were over eighty rural artists' communities across
northern and central Europe. This is the first book to offer
a critical analysis of this important phenomenon on the continent.
Nina Lübbren combines close visual readings of little-known
paintings with an innovative multidisciplinary approach, drawing
on sociology, geography, and theories of tourism.
Rural artists' colonies have been unjustly neglected by an art
history preoccupied with the urban avant-garde. Yet these communities
hatched some of the most exciting innovations of late nineteenth-century
painting. Moreover, the practices and images of rural artists
articulated central concerns of urban middle-class audiences,
in particular the yearning for a nostalgia-filled life that
was considered authentic, premodern, and immersed in nature.
Paradoxically, it was precisely this perception that placed
artists' colonies firmly within modernity, mainly through their
contribution to an emergent mass tourism.
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The
Good and Simple Life: Artist Colonies in Europe and America
by Michael Jacobs – Hardcover: 176 pages Publisher: Harpercollins
(June 1986)
