John White Alexander

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For other people named John Alexander, see John Alexander (disambiguation).
John White Alexander
Alexander in 1882 or 1883
Born(1856-10-07)October 7, 1856
Allegheny, Pennsylvania
DiedMay 31, 1915(1915-05-31) (aged 58)
New York
NationalityAmerican
Known forPainting
Isabella and the Pot of Basil, oil on canvas, 1897, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

John White Alexander (7 October 1856 – 31 May 1915) was an American portrait, figure, and decorative painter and illustrator.

Early life

Alexander was born in

telegraph boy in Pittsburgh. Edward J. Allen became an early supporter and patron of John W. Alexander, adopting the orphaned Alexander while he worked at the Pacific and Atlantic Telegraph Co. as a young man.[1] Allen brought Alexander to the Allen home at "Edgehill" where Alexander painted various members of the Allen family, including Colonel Allen. His talent at drawing attracted the attention of one of his employers, who assisted him to develop them.[2]

Training

He moved to

Florence, Italy; the Netherlands; and Paris
.

In 1881, he returned to New York City and speedily achieved great success in portraiture, numbering among his sitters Oliver Wendell Holmes, John Burroughs, Henry G. Marquand, R.A.L. Stevenson, and president McCosh of Princeton University.

Awards and honors

His first exhibition in the

American Academy of Arts and Letters, and president of the National Society of Mural Painters. Among the gold medals received by him were those of the Paris Exposition (1900) and the World's Fair
in St. Louis, Missouri (1904). He served as president of the National Society of Mural Painters from 1914 to 1915.[3]

Personal life

Portrait of Mrs. John W. Alexander

Alexander was married to Elizabeth Alexander Alexander, to whom he was introduced in part because of their shared last name. Elizabeth was the daughter of James Waddell Alexander, president of the

Equitable Life Assurance Society at the time of the Hyde Ball scandal. The Alexanders had one child, the mathematician James Waddell Alexander II
.

Alexander died in New York on 31 May 1915.

Works

Many of his paintings are in museums and public places in the United States and in Europe, including the

Brooklyn Art Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Butler Institute, and the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. In addition, in the entrance hall to the Art Museum of the Carnegie Institute
in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a series of Alexander's murals titled "Apotheosis of Pittsburgh" (1905–1907) covers the walls of the three-story atrium area.

Alexander's artist's proof of his portrait of Whitman, signed by the artist in April 1911, is in the Walt Whitman Collection at the University of Pennsylvania.[4]

Gallery

References

  1. ^ "Hervey Allen Papers". University Library System, University of Pittsburgh. Archived from the original on 2 June 2014. Retrieved 4 March 2015.
  2. ^ "Hervey Allen Papers". University Library System, University of Pittsburgh. Archived from the original on 2 June 2014. Retrieved 4 March 2015.
  3. ^ "National Society of Mural Painters". Archived from the original on 2018-10-15. Retrieved 2020-02-07.
  4. ^ "Walt Whitman collection, 1842-1957".

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to John White Alexander.

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the

New International Encyclopedia (1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Missing or empty |title= (help
)

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