| Facts/Data
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Birth
1879 (New York City)
Death
1956 (New York City)
Lived/Active
New York
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painting-street-circus-coastal, mural
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Categories of Interest
New York Armory Show of 1913
Old Lyme Colony Painters
San Francisco Panama-Pacific Exhibition 1915
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This biography from the Archives of AskART:
|  Gifford Beal, painter, etcher, muralist, and teacher, was born in New York
City in 1879. The son of landscape painter William Reynolds Beal, Gifford
Beal began studying at William Merritt Chase's Shinnecock School of Art
(the first established school of plein air painting in America) at the
age of thirteen, when he accompanied his older brother, Reynolds, to
summer classes. He remained a pupil of Chase's for ten years also
studying with him in New York City at the artist's private studio in
the Tenth Street Studio Building. Later at his father's behest, he
attended Princeton University from 1896 to 1900 while still continuing
his lessons with Chase. Upon graduation from Princeton he took classes
at the Art Students' League, studying with impressionist landscape
painter Henry Ward Ranger and Boston academic painter Frank Vincent
DuMond. He ended up as President of the Art Students League for fourteen
years, "a distinction unsurpassed by any other artist."
His
student days were spent entirely in this country. "Given the
opportunity to visit Paris en route to England in 1908, he chose to
avoid it" he stated, "I didn't trust myself with the delightful life in
ParisIt all sounded so fascinating and easy and loose." His subjects
were predominately American, and it has been said stylistically "his art
is completely American." Gifford achieved early recognition in the New
York Art World.
He became an associate member of the National
Academy of Design in 1908 and was elected to full status of academician
in 1914. He was known for garden parties, circuses, landscapes,
streets, coasts, flowers and marines. This diversity in subject matter
created "no typical or characteristic style to his work."
Beal's style
was highly influenced by Chase and Childe Hassam, a long time friend of
the Beal family who used to travel "about the countryside with Beal in
a car sketching local sights." Both Hassam and Chase were famous
for their impressionist views of New York City and Connecticut and Long
Island coastlines.
Beal's early work reflects his acquaintance with
these painters and focused on the city's commercial and industrial
growth. "Beal's major influence, however, remained Chase, whose
"greatness" Beal attributed to the "sheer fullness of his naturehis
store of energy," and his dedication to the profession of painting.
"When the story of American art is finally told," Beal predicted,
"Chase's name will be high on the list of the great."
Regarding his use
of color, one art critic wrote: "On the whole he is inclined toward
color that is rich and strong. The garden scenes have masses of deep
and gleaming foliage over the gay scenes below. The circus pictures are
resplendent in hue. He takes the rich green that crowns the cliffs at
Montauk and with it gives depth and richness to their tawny sides. The
ocean in Sword Fisherman is an intense blue, neither light nor dark,
and full of almost imperceptible shadings."
Beal found early
success with his views of the Hudson Valley where his family had an
estate called Willellen in Newburgh, overlooking the Hudson River. A
gifted technician and draftsman Beal did considerable mural painting
including seven panels portraying the life of scientist John Henry;
North Country and Tropical Country, Department of the Interior
building, Washington, D.C and others. Renewing an early interest for
the sea, a subject he had favored during his student years, Beal
started to achieve recognition for his marine landscapes. In 1921 he
began spending most of his summers on the Massachusetts coast, first at
Provincetown and then at Rockport. Both he and his brother Reynolds had a
strong attraction to the sea.
In the 1940's, Beal, never one
to rest on his laurels made a dramatic stylistic change, his painting
technique "became freer as he replaced naturalistic perspective with an
intricately patterned and flattened picture plane." These "more
decorative" works echoed ancient Persian paintings as well as the work
of Maurice and Charles Prendergast whose art Beal greatly admired. In
the end he adopted a "less objective" style that was high key and
"utilizing softer edges." This new work was said to be influenced by
Raoul Dufy. However many influences one may choose to cite in Beal's
work this is secondary to the fact that Gifford Beal throughout his
artistic career derived a strongly personal statement in his art that
was "fundamentally sound and aesthetically pleasing."
Beal's
paintings have been exhibited at the National Academy of Design,
1901-1921, 1923, 1930-1938, 1942-1943, 1947-1952, 1954-1956; Worcester
Art Museum (prize), 1903; Art Institute Chicago, 1904, 1909-1919,
1921,1923-1932, 1934, 1936-1944, 1946 and 1949; Pennsylvania Academy of
Fine Arts, 1904, 1906, 1908-09, 1911-12, 1914-16, 1918-20, 1924-26,
1929-30, 1932-47, 1950, 1952 and 1956; St. Louis Exposition (medal)
1904; Armory Show, 1913; Corcoran Gallery, Washington, DC; Panama
Pacific Exposition, (medal) 1915; Society of Independent Artists, 1917;
Kraushaar Galleries; International Exposition, Paris; Carnegie
Institute; Retrospective Exhibition, Century Club, NY; San Francisco
Museum; San Joaquin Museum; Des Moines Art Center; Butler Institute;
Scripps College; American Academy of Arts and Letters; Phillips
Collection; Montclair Art Museum and others. He was a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters, the American Institute of Arts
and Letters, the Architectural League of America, and the National
Society of Mural Painters. His work can be found in numerous museums
and public collections across the country. Gifford Beal passed away on
Feb. 5th 1956 at the age of seventy-five in New York City.
Source:
Blake Benton Fine Art |
This biography from the Archives of AskART:
|  A painter of nature but basically an inhabitant of New York City,
Gifford Beal created work that focuses in a modernist style on a
variety of subjects including marine, circus scenes, and the Hudson
River Valley where he also lived for many years.
He was born
in New York, graduated from Princeton in 1900, and studied with William
Merritt Chase for ten years at the Art Students League and also there
with George Bridgman and Frank Vincent DuMond. From 1914 to 1929, he
was President of the Art Students League.
In addition to oil
painting, he did considerable mural painting including seven panels
portraying the life of scientist John Henry. He was a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters, the American Institute of Arts
and Letters, the Architectural League of America, and the National
Society of Mural Painters.
Source:
David Michael Zellman, Three Hundred Years of American Art
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Biography from The Caldwell Gallery - I:
| Gifford Beal was a well educated, upper class painter born in 1879. He studied with William Merritt Chase in NYC, took courses at Shinnecock Summer School from 1891-1900, and graduated from Princeton in 1900. He received his first award in 1903 with continued acclaim and financial success throughout his career.
Beal was a member of several national boards and committees in the arts as well as the President of the Art Students League from 1914-1929.
Beal was could not be confined to one subject or genre because he preferred to develop his own personal taste with a broad combination of elements. He painted watercolors in Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, Bermuda and even West Africa. He also painted scenes along the New England coast as well as circuses, another favorite.
The Century Club of San Francisco held a retrospective show in 1950, just six years before his death.
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