Category : Monday’s Muse
Camille Claudel was born on the 8th of December, 1864. Her father, Louis-Prosper Claudel, was a mid-tier civil servant, and her mother, Louise Athanaïse Cécile Cerveaux, came from a respected Catholic family from the Champagne region. During Camille’s early years the family moved frequently – her father was constantly being reassigned to new posts throughout
Charis Wilson was born to Harry and Helen Wilson on May 5th, 1914. Harry was a successful writer and had built his family a large house in Carmel, California. From a young age Charis was outgoing and believed she would follow in the footsteps of her literary family. Her grandmother, father and great-aunt were all
James Abbot McNeil Whistler was born on July 10th, 1834, in Lowell, Massachusetts. Whistler’s father, George, was a railroad engineer, and his work took the family all over New England, where he held posts at a variety of rail companies. In 1839, George was asked to be Chief Engineer of the Boston & Albany Railroad.
Alex Katz was born in 1927 in Brooklyn, New York. His parents had fled the Soviet Revolution in Russia, and arrived in America with almost nothing. Katz attended Copper Union from 1946 to 1949, and finished his studies at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine. Much like Andrew Wyeth and Edward Hopper, Katz
Walter Keane was born on October 7th, 1915. He was one of ten children. Keane grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska, and from an early age he showed a talent for sales. He was in the words of his second wife, Margaret, “just oozing with charm.” It was charm beyond anything else, which Keane honed and
Andrew Wyeth was born on July 12th, 1917. He was the youngest son of the famed illustrator and painter N.C. Wyeth. As a young boy he suffered from frequent chest infections and difficulties with his hip. His father, believing him to be too frail to attend school, decided instead to homeschool him on the family’s
Joshua Reynolds was born on the 16th of July, 1723, in the town of Plympton. His father was the Reverend Samuel Reynolds who was a former fellow of Balliol College and master of the local school. From a young age, Reynolds showed a particular talent for draughtsmanship and his elder sister, Mary, encouraged his artistic
Josephine V. Nivison was born in 1884 in Manhattan to a father who was a piano teacher and a musician, and somewhat absent minded. Whilst her early life was punctuated by frequent upheavals and moves around the city, she was grateful that her family never left. She once remarked that unlike others, she had never
Constantin Brancusi first encountered Margit Pogany in 1910, some seven years after he had moved to Paris. Their relationship, comprised of only a handful of sittings, had such a profound effect on Brancusi that it shaped the series of sculptures titled Mademoiselle Pogany that he worked on for over 23 years. Brancusi was born to a
Paul Gauguin was as much an author as he was a painter. Throughout his career he sought to cultivate and hone the telling of his personal story as much as he worked to express a visual vocabulary that was entirely his own. From his early paintings of Breton women working in the fields to the
