(August 18, 1863 - March 18, 1930) was an American painter best known for his series of 78 scenes from American history, entitled The Pageant of a Nation, the largest series of American historical paintings by a single artist. He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of Stephen James Ferris, a portrait painter and a devotee of Jean-L??on G??rôme (after whom he was named) and Mariano Fortuny.He grew up around art, having been trained by his father and having two acclaimed painters, Edward Moran and Thomas Moran, as uncles. Ferris enrolled in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1879 and trained further at the Acad??mie Julian beginning in 1883 under William-Adolphe Bouguereau.He also met his namesake G??rôme, who greatly influenced Ferris's decision to paint scenes from American history. As Ferris wrote in his unpublished autobiography, "[G??rôme's] axiom was that one would paint best that with which he is most familiar". However, initially his subjects were Orientalist in nature, that movement having been in vogue when he was young. Some of his material was original, some of it took after Fortuny, but he was skilled enough, despite never having had any experience with Asia. In 1882, he exhibited a painting entitled Feeding the Ibis, which was valued at $600. By 1895, Ferris had gained a reputation as a historical painter, and he embarked on his dream of creating a series of paintings that told a historical narrative. In 1898 he sold one of these, General Howe's Levee, 1777, but he later regretted it, realizing that such a series could not be complete if the separate paintings could not be kept together. As such, he never sold another one of those, but he did sell the reproduction rights to various publishing companies. This later would have the effect of greatly popularizing his work, as these companies made prints, postcards, calendars and blank-backed trade cards use in advertisements. Laminated cards of these works were still being sold as late as 1984. The Landing of William PennThe paintings showed idealized portrayals of famous moments from American history, but were often historically inaccurate. The Landing of William Penn, for example, shows Penn being greeted at New Castle by American Indians who are clothed in the tradition of tribes from the Great Plains. In The First Thanksgiving 1621, the black outfits the Pilgrims are shown wearing are wrong, and the Wampanoag did not wear feathered war bonnets, nor would they have been sitting on the ground. The complete series was shown at Independence Hall in Philadelphia from 1913 to 1930, then moved next door to Congress Hall. In later years it was shown in a number of locations, including the Smithsonian Institution, before being returned to the Ferris family.  Related Paintings of Jean Leon Gerome Ferris :. | The Fall of New Amsterdam | Landing of William Penn | Betsy Ross | Captain Kidd in New York Harbor | Building the Cradle of Liberty |
Related Artists:
Merle, Hugues
French, 1823-1881
Domenica Battaglia
painted La Fontana delle Paperelle, Napoli, in 1842/46-1904
Edith Corbet
(28 December 1846 Goulburn, New South Wales - 1920 Hampstead), was a Victorian landscape painter, having close associations with the Macchiaioli group (also known as the Tuscans or Etruscans), who, in a break with tradition, painted outdoors in order to capture natural light effects and favoured a panoramic format for their paintings. Edith was born in Goulburn, New South Wales, Australia, the second daughter and fifth child of Henry Edenborough and Margaret Stedman. The Edenborough family came from Leicestershire, but relocated to London, where they became prosperous merchants in hosiery and silk. Henry Edenborough was a sea captain and made several voyages to Australia between 1833 and 1837, deciding to settle there in 1840. He acquired a farm south of Goulburn known as 'Wollogorang' and built "a handsome two-storey brick and stone rubble building notable for its interesting French windows and its impressive outbuildings". This was the family home until 1854 when Henry and Margaret sold the property to John William Chisholm, and returned to England with their family of six children. Henry died in 1855 at Chesham Lodge in Surrey, aged 43. In 1861 the British census records show Edith, 14 years old, living with her widowed mother in Kensington. The 1871 census shows her living with her sister Annie, noted as head of household, at 5 Sheffield Gardens in Kensington, in which year she was exhibiting her work in London. She married the painter Arthur Murch and moved to Rome where she painted with Giovanni Costa, leader of the Macchiaioli group. In 1876 they both stayed in Venice. Olivia Rossetti Agresti wrote: "Costa had a very high opinion of this artist's gifts and used to remember with pleasure how on that occasion they used to go out together to paint from nature at Fusino" (Agresti, 1904). Edith Murch frequently exhibited from 1880 to 1890 at the Grosvenor Gallery and the New Gallery. In 1891 she married Matthew Ridley Corbet, one of the Macchiaioli group's leading members, after which she exhibited mainly at the Royal Academy, visiting Italy and living in London for the remainder of her life.