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Profile
Portrait of
James Carroll Beckwith
June 1874
Sargent
at Harvard
Graphite
on gray wove
paper
22.9 x
15.2 cm (actual)
Gift
of Mrs. Francis
Ormond
Inscription:
l.r., graphite:
J. C. Beckwith / June 1874
verso,
l.r., graphite:
1937.8.3
Jpeg:
Sargent
at Harvard
James Carroll
Beckwith (1852-1917)
was another American artist at Carolus-Duran's atelier. Having been
there
prior to Sargent, Beckwith already knew a number of the expatriate
American
students -- many of whom came from the New York National Academy of
Design.
(See
Beckwith's account of meeting Sargent)
James
Carroll Beckwith
John
Singer Sargent -- drawn from Life 1876
John and Carroll
(Beckwith hated
using his first name) became fast and dear friends and would share
studio
space in Paris. It would be through Beckwith that Sargent quickly
became
acquainted with the other expatriates.
Carroll was four
years older than
John. He was born in Hannibal Missouri (the same town Mark Twain came
from)
but grew up in Chicago where his father started a business. In 1868 he
studied art at the Chicago Academy of Design under Walter Sherlaw until
the great fire of 1871 destroyed eveything (including much of the heart
of the city). He then went to New York and studied at the National
Academy
of Design under Lemuel Wilmarth, but eventually, like many other
students,
traveled on to Europe to learn from the Mecca of the art world -- Paris
-- arriving there in November, 1873 (six months before John).
Like John, his
timing wasn't good.
The ateliers were mostly filled having resumed in October to coincide
with
the term of the Ecole
des Beaux-Arts. Beckwith tried two other ateliers before finding
space
at Carolus-Duan's.
In 1877,
Carolus-Duran picked both
Sargent and Beckwith to help him with the mural decoration work for the
Palais du Luxembourg, The
triump of Maria de Medici.
In the Summer of
1878, Carroll
left Paris and returned to the United States. He eventually became an
associate
member of the National Academy of Design (don't know if he ever became
a full member) and taught at the Cooper Union.
He married Bertha
Hall, June 1, 1887,
and Sargent gave them a Venetian watercolor as a present.
Beckwith took an
active part in the
formation of the Fine Arts Society and was president of the National
Free
Art league which worked to secure the repeal of the US duty on works of
Art into the United States. Among his portraits are those of W.M. Chase
(1882) (Sargent painted Chase), X. Jordan (1883),
Mark Twain, T.A.
Janvier, Gen John
Schofield, and William Walton.
Beckwith received
many awards including
Honorable Mention at the Paris Exposition of 1889 and a Gold Medal at
the
Atlanta Exposition in 1895. He exhibited at the St. Louis Worlds Fair
(1904)
showing "The Nautilus" along with a portrait of his wife
--
Mrs. Beckwith.
Carroll returned to
paris in 1893
to paint a number of murals and then back for murals in the Liberal
Arts
Building at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. He lived
in Italy from 1910 to 1914 and painted many plein-air studies of
monuments,
buildings, and landscapes.
He died in New York
City on October
24, 1917
This is one
of Sargent's longest
friendships. Beckwith visited John in London and they see each other
when
he was in the States.
Notes:
Most of this
information comes from
Olson's book which shows 28 references between the pages of 40 and 266.
Also, Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. 3, William Benton, 1962, P.291
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