William Merritt Chase Paintings

William Merritt Chase (November 1, 1849 – October 25, 1916) was an American painter, known as an exponent of Impressionism and as a teacher. He is also responsible for establishing the Chase School, which later would become Parsons School of Design.

William Merritt Chase was born on November 1, 1849, in Williamsburg (now Nineveh), Indiana, to the family of Sarah Swain and David H. Chase, a local businessman. Chase’s father moved the family to Indianapolis in 1861, and employed his son as a salesman in the family business. Chase showed an early interest in art, and studied under local, self-taught artists Barton S. Hays and Jacob Cox.

Chase worked in all media. He was most fluent in oil painting and pastel, but also created watercolor paintings and etchings. He is perhaps best known for his portraits, and his sitters including some of the most important men and women of his time. His portrait of painter Lydia Field Emmet in 1892 depicts Emmet in a pose typically reserved for men in old masters’ paintings. Emmet’s hand is on her hip and she looks over her shoulder at the audience.

Chase worked in all media. He was most fluent in oil painting and pastel, but also created watercolor paintings and etchings. He is perhaps best known for his portraits, and his sitters including some of the most important men and women of his time. His portrait of painter Lydia Field Emmet in 1892 depicts Emmet in a pose typically reserved for men in old masters’ paintings. Emmet’s hand is on her hip and she looks over her shoulder at the audience.

The first was his scenes of Prospect and Central Parks in New York; the second were his summer landscapes at Shinnecock. Chase usually featured people prominently in his landscapes. Often he depicted woman and children in leisurely poses, relaxing on a park bench, on the beach, or lying in the summer grass at Shinnecock. The Shinnecock works in particular have come to be thought of by art historians as particularly fine examples of American Impressionism.

Chase died on October 25, 1916, at his home in New York City, an esteemed elder of the American art world. He was interred in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.

Today his works are in most major museums in the United States. His home and studio at Shinnecock Hills, New York, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 as the William Merritt Chase Homestead.

Source: Wikipedia

William Merritt Chase Art Galllery