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Lovell Birge Harrison (October 28, 1854, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – 1929) was an American genre and landscape painter, teacher, and writer. He was a prominent practitioner and advocate of
He then went to Paris on the advice of John Singer Sargent to study with Carolus-Duran and at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, École des Beaux-Arts under Alexandre Cabanel, Cabanel. In 1881 Harrison exhibited at the Paris Salon, and in 1882 his Salon entry, ''Novembre'', became one of the first paintings by an American artist to be purchased by the French government. Discussing the painting years later Harrison attributed its handling to "A Scandinavian painter (who) had shown me the secret of atmospheric painting....and....the importance of vibration and refraction in landscape painting."Gerdts, et al, 230 The paintings of this period included peasant subjects that showed the influence of Jules Bastien-Lepage. The limited palette and wistful mood of the early works would continue to be distinguishing features of Harrison's later landscape paintings.
Harrison met the Australian painter Eleanor Ritchie in the course of his summer landscape travels; they married and returned to America, where he began to exhibit annually at the National Academy of Design, and after 1889 at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Temporarily forced to stop painting on account of ill health, he spent considerable time between 1889 and 1893 traveling in Australia, the Polynesia, South Seas, and New Mexico, and wrote and illustrated articles for publication. In 1891 Harrison and his wife moved to California, but after her death in 1895 while expecting their first child, Harrison remarried and moved to Plymouth, Massachusetts, where he became a leader of the Tonalist school. He then relocated again, this time to Woodstock, New York at the turn of the century where he founded a school based on his experiments in Tonalism. In 1906 Harrison helped found the Art Students League Summer School in Woodstock, where his pupils would include his niece, the architect and painter Margaret Fulton Spencer. He became known especially for his paintings of landscapes in the snow.
Harrison received numerous prizes and medals, including the gold medal at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1910. He became a member of the National Academy of Design in 1910, National Institute of Arts and Letters, New York Water Color Club, Society of American Artists, and was director of the landscape school of the Art Students League of New York, Art Students League.
In 1909 Harrison's lectures were published in a book entitled ''Landscape Painting''; the book was cited as "a standard work for students, and was referred to as "a fine commentary on the technique of the craft."''The New York Times'', November 14, 1909
/ref> According to art historian William H. Gerdts, Harrison was then "the leading writer in America on contemporary landscape painting."Gerdts, 296 Harrison's writing reveals an interest in the retinal perception of color, and in tonal harmony; he believed that the term Impressionism was descriptive not merely of the recent movement in French painting, but referred to any work done "honestly and sincerely" before nature. Harrison's painting exemplified the lessons he taught, emphasizing the practice of open-air observation rather than technical facility. Harrison's pupils included Florence Ballin Cramer, Mary Gine Riley and Florence Thaw.
''Harrison Genealogy Repository''
''Paintings and Sculpture in the Collection of the National Academy of Design'', p. 249
* Gerdts, William H. ''American Impressionism''. Abbeville, 1984. * Gerdts, William H., et al. ''Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France 1865–1915''. Terra Foundation of the Arts, 1992.
Biography, The Johnson Collection
''The New York Times'', November 14, 1909
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Harrison, Lovell Birge Painters from Philadelphia 19th-century American painters American male painters 20th-century American painters 1854 births 1929 deaths Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni American alumni of the École des Beaux-Arts National Academy of Design members Art Students League of New York faculty American genre painters American landscape painters 20th-century American non-fiction writers American art writers People from New Hope, Pennsylvania Pennsylvania Impressionism 20th-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers Students of Thomas Eakins Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters 19th-century American male artists 20th-century American male artists
Tonalism
Tonalism was an artistic style that emerged in the 1880s when Visual art of the United States, American artists began to paint landscape forms with an overall tone of colored atmosphere or mist. Between 1880 and 1915, dark, neutral hues such as g ...
.
Life
Born inPhiladelphia
Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
, Birge Harrison was the brother of artist T. Alexander Harrison. He studied first at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1874, and later credited Thomas Eakins as a positive influence on his own teaching style.Biography, The Johnson CollectionHe then went to Paris on the advice of John Singer Sargent to study with Carolus-Duran and at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, École des Beaux-Arts under Alexandre Cabanel, Cabanel. In 1881 Harrison exhibited at the Paris Salon, and in 1882 his Salon entry, ''Novembre'', became one of the first paintings by an American artist to be purchased by the French government. Discussing the painting years later Harrison attributed its handling to "A Scandinavian painter (who) had shown me the secret of atmospheric painting....and....the importance of vibration and refraction in landscape painting."Gerdts, et al, 230 The paintings of this period included peasant subjects that showed the influence of Jules Bastien-Lepage. The limited palette and wistful mood of the early works would continue to be distinguishing features of Harrison's later landscape paintings.
Harrison met the Australian painter Eleanor Ritchie in the course of his summer landscape travels; they married and returned to America, where he began to exhibit annually at the National Academy of Design, and after 1889 at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Temporarily forced to stop painting on account of ill health, he spent considerable time between 1889 and 1893 traveling in Australia, the Polynesia, South Seas, and New Mexico, and wrote and illustrated articles for publication. In 1891 Harrison and his wife moved to California, but after her death in 1895 while expecting their first child, Harrison remarried and moved to Plymouth, Massachusetts, where he became a leader of the Tonalist school. He then relocated again, this time to Woodstock, New York at the turn of the century where he founded a school based on his experiments in Tonalism. In 1906 Harrison helped found the Art Students League Summer School in Woodstock, where his pupils would include his niece, the architect and painter Margaret Fulton Spencer. He became known especially for his paintings of landscapes in the snow.
Harrison received numerous prizes and medals, including the gold medal at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1910. He became a member of the National Academy of Design in 1910, National Institute of Arts and Letters, New York Water Color Club, Society of American Artists, and was director of the landscape school of the Art Students League of New York, Art Students League.
In 1909 Harrison's lectures were published in a book entitled ''Landscape Painting''; the book was cited as "a standard work for students, and was referred to as "a fine commentary on the technique of the craft."''The New York Times'', November 14, 1909/ref> According to art historian William H. Gerdts, Harrison was then "the leading writer in America on contemporary landscape painting."Gerdts, 296 Harrison's writing reveals an interest in the retinal perception of color, and in tonal harmony; he believed that the term Impressionism was descriptive not merely of the recent movement in French painting, but referred to any work done "honestly and sincerely" before nature. Harrison's painting exemplified the lessons he taught, emphasizing the practice of open-air observation rather than technical facility. Harrison's pupils included Florence Ballin Cramer, Mary Gine Riley and Florence Thaw.
Paintings
* ''Winter twilight'' (1910, 30 x 40 cm) * ''Meadow in the Connecticut'' * ''November'' (1881, Rennes, musée des beaux-arts de Rennes, France) * ''Le moulin rouge'' (1909) * ''Fifth Avenue in Winter'' * ''A Puff of Steam'' * ''The Old Inn at Cos Cob'' (1914)Notes
Sources
''Harrison Genealogy Repository''
''Paintings and Sculpture in the Collection of the National Academy of Design'', p. 249
* Gerdts, William H. ''American Impressionism''. Abbeville, 1984. * Gerdts, William H., et al. ''Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France 1865–1915''. Terra Foundation of the Arts, 1992.
Biography, The Johnson Collection
''The New York Times'', November 14, 1909
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Harrison, Lovell Birge Painters from Philadelphia 19th-century American painters American male painters 20th-century American painters 1854 births 1929 deaths Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni American alumni of the École des Beaux-Arts National Academy of Design members Art Students League of New York faculty American genre painters American landscape painters 20th-century American non-fiction writers American art writers People from New Hope, Pennsylvania Pennsylvania Impressionism 20th-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers Students of Thomas Eakins Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters 19th-century American male artists 20th-century American male artists