Clifford Prevost Grayson

Clifford Prevost Grayson (July 14, 1857 – November 11, 1951) was an American painter and teacher.

Clifford Prevost Grayson
Born(1857-07-14)July 14, 1857
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
DiedNovember 11, 1951(1951-11-11) (aged 94)
Old Lyme, Connecticut
Education
OccupationPainter, teacher
Spouse(s)
Anna L. Steel
​
​
(m. 1902; died 1945)​
Signature

Biography

He was born in Philadelphia, the youngest of the three sons of lawyer and newspaper editor Frederick William Grayson and Mary Mallett Prevost.[1] Grayson graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1878,[2] and studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts under Christian Schussele and Thomas Eakins.[3] He studied further at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris under Jean-Léon Gérôme.[2] After graduation, he joined the artist colonies at Pont Aven and Concarneau, and opened a studio in Paris.[2] Grayson was a regular exhibitor at the Paris Salon during the 1880s.[2]

Drexel Institute

Grayson returned to Philadelphia in 1890.[2] He was hired as instructor in oil painting at the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry in 1891, and promoted to director of the Art Department in 1893.[4]:122 Under Grayson, the art curriculum expanded from a 2-year to a 4-year program. He hired Howard Pyle as an instructor in 1894, in what became the School of Illustration.[4]:125 Grayson taught portraiture and life classes, and Charles Grafly taught clay modeling and sculpture. Thomas Eakins had been forced to resign from PAFA in 1886, after using a fully nude male model before female students. Grayson hired him to lecture in anatomy in January 1895, and dismissed him two months later, after Eakins again used a nude male model before a class that included female students.[5] When Grafly took a one-year sabbatical in 1895, Grayson hired Cyrus Dallin to teach the sculpture classes.[6] The Art Department seemed to flourish under Grayson, attracting students such as Maxfield Parrish, Elizabeth Shippen Green, Jessie Willcox Smith, Violet Oakley and Frank Schoonover.[4]:130 After being ordered to make severe budget cuts, Grayson tendered his resignation in December 1904.[4]:130–31 He left Drexel in June 1905, after the announcement of the dissolution of the Art Department.[4]:131

Later career

Grayson was an active member of the summer artist colony at Old Lyme, Connecticut.[7]

Honors and awards

Grayson received Honorable Mentions at the Paris Salons of 1885 and 1892.[2] The American Art Association awarded him the 1886 $2,000 Purchase Prize for Mid-day Dreams, and donated the painting to the Corcoran Gallery of Art.[8] He exhibited semi-regularly in PAFA's annual exhibitions, from 1876 to 1905.[9] PAFA awarded him the 1887 Temple Gold Medal for The Fisherman's Family, and purchased the painting for its collection.

He was a member of the Art Club of Philadelphia,[2] and the Salmagundi Club and Century Association in New York City.[7]

Personal

Grayson married Anna L. Steel (1867–1945) on January 21, 1902.[2] They lived at 262 S. 15th Street, Philadelphia, and had a daughter, Helen, and a son, Clifford Jr.[10] They retired to Old Lyme, Connecticut.[3]

Selected works
  • Boat, Ahoy! (1884), Salon of 1884[11]
  • The Fisherman's Family (1885), ex collection: PAFA. Honorable mention: Salon of 1885; Temple Gold Medal, PAFA, 1887
  • Mid-day Dreams (1886), ex collection: Corcoran Gallery of Art. $2,000 Purchase Prize, American Art Association, 1886
  • Rainy Day at Pont Aven (1892), ex collection: Art Institute of Chicago. Honorable mention: Salon of 1892

References
  1. Annual Proceedings of the Pennsylvania Society, Sons of the Revolution, 1913-14 (Philadelphia: 1914), p. 40.
  2. "GRAYSON, Clifford Prevost," National Cyclopedia of American Biography, Volume 13 (New York: J.T. White & Company, 1906), pp. 337-38.
  3. Kirsten M. Jensen, The American Salon: The Art Gallery at the Chicago Interstate Industrial Exposition, 1873-1890, Ph.D. diss., City University of New York, 2007, p. 419.
  4. Edward N. McDonald and Edward M. Hinton, Drexel Institute of Technology, 1891 – 1941, A Memorial History (Philadelphia: Haddon Craftsmen, Inc., 1942).
  5. "A Revolt at Drexel Institute. Indignation Caused by a Nude Male Model Before a Mixed Class. Professor Eakins Removed." The Philadelphia Times, March 14, 1895, p. 1.
  6. William Howe Downes, "Cyrus E. Dallin, Sculptor," Brush and Pencil, vol. 5, no. 1 (October 1899), p. 15.
  7. Who Was Who in America, Volume 4 (Chicago: Marquis Press, 1968), p. 376.
  8. Mid-day Dreams, from Library of Congress.
  9. Peter Hastings Falk, The Annual Exhibition Record of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Volume 2, 1876-1913 (Madison, CT: Sound View Press, 1989), pp. 219-220.
  10. Social Register Philadelphia 1923 (New York: The Social Register Association, 1922), p. 104.
  11. Marion Harry Spiellmann, The Magazine of Art, vol. 7, (Cassell, Petter & Gallpin, 1884), p. 499.
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