American Sculptor, 1883-1952,was an American sculptor of Russian-Jewish descent. Although he specialized in realistic, intense portrait busts, Davidson did not require his subjects to formally pose for him; rather, he observed and spoke with them. He worked primarily with clay, while the final products were typically cast in terra-cotta, marble and bronze. Born in New York City, Davidson attended Yale University before moving to Paris to study sculpture at Ecole nationale superieure des beaux arts in 1907. After returning to the United States, he was befriended by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, who purchased some of Davidson's work. In 1911 Davidson secured his first solo gallery shows; in 1934 he won the National Academy of Design Maynard Prize, and in 1947 the American Academy of Arts and Letters hosted a retrospective featuring nearly 200 of his works. He was one of 250 sculptors who exhibited in the 3rd Sculpture International held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the summer of 1949. Among Davidson commissions are a design for a United States War Industries badge, a collection of pieces for the Government of France to commemorate the first victory of the Troupes de Marine and bronze busts of the leaders of the Allies. His portraits of world leaders and celebrated personalities gained him international acclaim, and included such luminaries as Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Rudyard Kipling, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, Andrew Mellon, Will Rogers, John D. Rockefeller, Joseph Conrad, Anatole France, Lincoln Steffens, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, Marshall Ferdinand Foch, General John J. Pershing, John Marin, Rabindranath Tagore, Frank Harris, Israel Zangwill, Charlie Chaplin, Robert M. La Follette, Clarence Darrow, Emile Coue (who was also a sculptor in his spare time), H. G. Wells, Robinson Jeffers, Andre Gide. George Bernard Shaw, James Barrie, Arthur Conan Doyle,D. H. Lawrence, W. Averell Harriman, Madame Chiang Kai shek, Dolores Ibarruri, aka La Passionaria, Helen Keller, Mahatma Gandhi, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ida Rubinstein, Albert Einstein, Carl Sandburg, Marshall Tito, E. W. Marland and Walt Whitman. Will Rogers statue is a full-body bronze portrait erected at the United States Capitol in 1939. Walt Whitman portrait is also a full-body bronze, and stands in Bear Mountain State Park, New York. Some of Davidson's work is in the National Gallery of Art and in the Capitol Building where he has placed two works, Will Rogers of Oklahoma and Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin in the National Statuary Hall, and busts of two vice presidents, Henry A. Wallace and Charles G. Dawes, all of which are located in Washington, D.C.. He also designed a statue of Henry D. Thoreau, the author of WALDEN. The statue is located at Walden Pond State Reservation in Concord, MA. In 2006, The Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait Gallery opened a permanent exhibition, Jo Davidson: Biographer in Bronze, showcasing fourteen Davidson works in terracotta and bronze, including portraits of Gertrude Stein and Lincoln Steffens.   Related Paintings of Jo Davidson :. | Head of a young peasant with a Pipe | Graing Horses i (mk34) | Bay Stallion | Landscape with Irises | Mademoiselle Romaine Lacaux |
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John Trumbull
1756-1843 John Trumbull Gallery Trumbull was born in Lebanon, Connecticut, to Jonathan Trumbull, who was Governor of Connecticut from 1769 to 1784. He entered the 1771 junior class at Harvard University at age fifteen and graduated in 1773. Due to a childhood accident, Trumbull lost use of one eye, which may have influenced his detailed painting style. As a soldier in the American Revolutionary War, Trumbull rendered a particular service at Boston by sketching plans of the British works, and witnessed the famous Battle of Bunker Hill. He was appointed second personal aide to General George Washington, and in June 1776 deputy adjutant-general to General Horatio Gates, but resigned from the army in 1777. In 1780 he traveled to London where he studied under Benjamin West, who suggested to him that he paint small pictures of the War of Independence and miniature portraits, of which he produced about 250 in his lifetime. On September 23, 1780 and October 2, 1780, British agent Major John Andr?? was, respectively, captured and hanged as a spy in America. News reached Europe, and as an officer of similar rank as Andr?? in the Continental Army, Trumbull was imprisoned for seven months in London's Tothill Fields Bridewell. In 1784 he was again in London working under West, in whose studio he painted his Battle of Bunker Hill and Death of Montgomery, both of which are now in the Yale University Art Gallery. In 1785 Trumbull went to Paris, where he made portrait sketches of French officers for The Surrender of Cornwallis, and began, with the assistance of Jefferson, Declaration of Independence, well-known from the engraving by Asher Brown Durand. This latter painting was purchased by the United States Congress along with his Surrender of General Burgoyne, Surrender at Yorktown, and Washington Resigning his Commission, and these paintings now hang in the United States Capitol. Trumbull's The Sortie Made by the Garrison of Gibraltar, 1789, owned by the Boston Athenaeum, is now in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
John Jackson
(31 May 1778 - 1 June 1831) was an English painter. Jackson was born in Lastingham, Yorkshire, and started his career as an apprentice tailor to his father, who opposed the artistic ambitions of his son. However, he enjoyed the support of Henry Phipps, 1st Earl of Mulgrave (1755-1831), who recommended him to the Earl of Carlisle, as well as that of Sir George Beaumont, 7th Baronet - who offered him residence at his own home and ₤50 per annum - and was able to attend the Royal Academy Schools, where he befriended David Wilkie and B. R. Haydon. At Castle Howard, residence of the Earl of Carlisle, he could study and copy from a large collection of paintings. His watercolours were judged to be of uncommon quality. By 1807 his reputation as a portrait painter was assured, and he made the transition to oils steadily, if not easily, regularly forwarding paintings to Somerset House. After a visit to the Netherlands and Flanders with Edmund Phipps in 1816, he accompanied Sir Francis Chantrey on a trip to Switzerland, Rome, Florence and Venice in 1819. In Rome he was elected to the Academy of St Luke. His portrait of Antonio Canova, painted on this trip, was regarded as being outstanding. Jackson was a prolific portraitist, strongly showing the influence of Sir Thomas Lawrence and Henry Raeburn in his work. His sitters included the Duke of Wellington, the explorer Sir John Franklin and some noted Wesleyan ministers. His 1823 portrait of Lady Dover, wife of George Agar-Ellis, 1st Baron Dover, was widely acclaimed. He was a Royal Academy student from 9 March 1805, was elected an Associate of the RA on 6 November 1815 and elected a full member on 10 Feb 1817. John Jackson was married twice - the first marriage was to the daughter of a jeweller, the second to Matilda the daughter of the painter James Ward. He died in St John's Wood, London.
John William North,ARA,RWS
1842-1924