CHICAGO PAINTING 1895 TO 1945: THE BRIDGES COLLECTION - Softcover

Kent Smith; Susan C. Larsen; Wendy Greenhouse; Susan Weiniger

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0252072227 ISBN 13: 9780252072222

Publisher: University of Illinois Press, 2005

Synopsis

As Chicago grew into the world-class city it is today, its civic leaders took exceptional care in their cultivation of the arts. The establishment of the Art Institute, the widespread support of wealthy patronage, and the activity of numerous organizations including the Chicago Architectural Club, the Urban League, and the Chicago Women's Club, combined to make Chicago home to many painters. Since rising from the ashes in 1873, Chicago has supported generation after generation of inspired artists who painted land and cityscapes, and honored their patrons with portraits. The full length and breadth of their amazing work can at last be appreciated in the Powell and Barbara Bridges Collection.          
 
Susan C. Larsen provides a profile of the collectors and introduces the Bridges Collection, featuring an impressive range of canvases by Charles Francis Browne, Alice Kellogg Tyler, Frank Peyraud, Alfred Juergens, and other notable painters. Formerly the private treasure of the Bridges, Chicago Painting makes all 78 paintings of their remarkable collection available, in full color, to art lovers the world over. 
 
Wendy Greenhouse offers a host of insights into the lives and work of the artists who worked prior to the turn of the last century.  She surveys the "conservative" Chicago painters who resisted the avant-garde, showing that while the European avant-garde did exert an influence, excellent work continued to be done in traditional genres such as portraits and landscapes.  Painters the quality of Junius Sloan, Lucie Hartrath, George Peter Alexander Healy, Louis Betts, Ralph Clarkson, and Daniel Folger Bigelow are represented here.
 
Finally, Susan Weiniger guides us into the Modernist era Chicago painters--Gertrude Abercrombie, Frances Strain, Frederic Tellander, Rudolph Weisenborn, and others--whose works show conclusively that Chicago did more than import avant-garde painting. Chicago Painting 1895 to 1945 also includes updated biographies of 49 painters and commentary on each painting.
 

About this title

About the Author:

Susan C. Larsen is a collector for the New England Regional Area for the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Wendy Greenhouse is an independent art historian and curator in Chicago. Susan Weininger is a professor of art history and director of Liberal Studies at Roosevelt University, Chicago. Kent Smith is the art director for the Illinois State Museum.
 

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0252072227
• ISBN 13: 9780252072222
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256