Robert Swain Gifford
Robert Swain Gifford
American , 1840 – 1905
Robert Swain Gifford was born on the small island of Nonamesset near Martha ’ s Vineyard in Massachusetts in 1840 . When he was two , his family moved to New Bedford where he would begin his education . To his advantage , he was able to learn French and how to play the violin from Mrs . William Swain , the family ’ s proprietor . His liberal arts training continued when the Dutch marine painter Albert van Beest settled in nearby Fairhaven ; he became his teacher when he was fourteen . Gifford first opened a studio in Boston in 1864 but after two years , he concluded that New York would be more suitable . The late 1860s marked the beginning of Gifford ’ s many sketching trips out West and abroad . In 1869 , he traveled to Oregon , California , and the Washington Territory , capturing a number of scenes , many of the majestic Columbia River , for William Cullen Bryant ’ s book Picturesque America . A year later , he joined the gifted painter and designer Louis Comfort Tiffany on a trip abroad to London , Paris , Tangier , and to Cairo where they sailed down the Nile .
In 1873 , Gifford married Frances Eliot , one of his students at the National Academy of Design , and together they traveled to Europe and North Africa . Gifford won a medal for his painting , Cairo , at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition , and for other works at the Paris Exposition ( 1889 ), the Buffalo Pan-American Exposition ( 1901 ), and the Charleston Exposition ( 1902 ). Continuing his journeys abroad , Gifford went to Scandinavia and northern Germany with Francis Davis Millet and Edwin Austin Abbey in 1882 . Gifford also joined the 1899 Harriman Alaska Expedition . Led by the railroad magnate Edward H . Harriman , Gifford , fellow artists Frederick S . Dellenbaugh and Louis Agassiz Fuertes , and photographer Edward Curtis spent two months documenting the Alaskan coast . Gifford also helped found the New York Etching Club , and he was director of the Cooper Union from 1896 – 1905 .
Napoleon Sarony ( American , b . Canada , 1821 – 1896 ), Robert Swain Gifford , ca . 1870 – 1890 , albumen print , 4 x 2 1/2 in ., Museum of the City of New York , 41.366.18
REFERENCES : Ackerman , Gerald M . American Orientalists . Courbevoie / Paris :
ACR , 1994 . “ American Painters — Robert Swain Gifford .” The Art Journal 3
( 1877 ): 310 – 312 .
Dearinger , David Bernard . ed . Paintings and Sculpture in the Collection of the National Academy of Design . Volume 1 , 1826- 1925 . New York : Hudson Hills Press , 2004 .
Gaw , Cooper . “ Robert Swain Gifford , Landscape-Painter . Brush and Pencil 15 , no . 4 ( April 1905 ): 201 – 209 , 211-218 .
Montgomery , Walter , ed . American Art and American Art Collections : Essays on Artistic Subjects by the Best Art Writers , Fully Illustrated with Etchings , Photoetchings , Photogravures ,
72 THE TILE CLUB : Camaraderie and American Plein-Air Painting