Cecilia Beaux

1855 – 1942

American painter. She began her career painting on porcelain and producing lithographs and portrait drawings. She studied with Catharine Ann Drinker (1871), Francis Adolf van der Wielen (1872-73) and Camille Piton (1879), at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia (1877-78), and privately with William Sartain (1881-83). Under Sartain's guidance, she learnt to paint, producing her first major portrait, the Last Days of Infancy (1883-5; private collection). She completed her art training in Paris at the Académie Julian and the Académie Colorossi (1888-89). She had the coaching of painters like Robert-Fleury, Bouguereau and Dagnan Bouveret. In 1890 she exhibited at the Paris Exposition. Returning to Philadelphia, she obtained in 1893 the gold medal of the Philadelphia Art Club, and also the Dodge prize at the New York National Academy, and later various other distinctions. She became a member of the National Academy of Design, New York, in 1902. Among her portraits are those of Bishop-Coadjutor Greer (exhibited at the Salon in 1896); Mrs Roosevelt and her daughter; and Mrs Larz Anderson. Her Dorothea and Francesca, and Ernesta and her Little Brother, are good examples of her skill in painting children.

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