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Ad Code: 3
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An example of work by Spencer Baird Nichols
Artwork images are copyright of the artist or assignee
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This biography from the Archives of AskART:
|  Spencer Baird Nichols' childhood was spent in Washington, D.C. where he
attended the Corcoran School of Art and the Washington Art Students'
League. At the Corcoran he studied under Howard Helmick, a
student of James McNeill Whistler. At the age of 17, he was
appointed an Instructor of Illustration at the Art Students' League.
His
father, Henry Hobart Nichols, was an eminent wood engraver who won a
gold medal at the 1876 Centennial Exhibit in Philadelphia.
Spencer
worked for the Geological Survey and the National Museum. A
portrait of Andrew Stephenson, Speaker of the House, by him, hangs in
the Speaker's Lobby of the House of Representatives.
For a
number of years until World War I, he was Chief Designer of the Louis
Comfort Tiffany studios, designing mosaics*, windows and interiors, as
well as painting murals for the firm, all under the signature of
Tiffany. He did murals for the WPA* in the Kent, Litchfield and
New Milford schools in Connecticut.
He served for a short time during the Spanish American War and during the first World War was a navy camafleur.
Illustrations of children's books were his favorite, and he did Dickens's Christmas Carols, Oscar Wilde's Little Prince, and a number of books of poetry by Alfred Noyes published by Frederick A. Stokes & Company.
Among
his many prizes were the 3rd Corcoran Prize, Society of Washington
Artists and at the National Academy of Design* two Ranger Fund Purchase
Awards and the coveted Altman prize.
Much of Mr. Nichol's work
was destroyed in a disastrous fire in his house and studio in
1932. From 1934 he was Director of Art at Marot Jr. College in
Thompson, Connecticut until 1941 when the school closed.
He was a member of the Washington Water Color Club, Society of Washington
Artists,
The Salmagundi Club*, the National Arts Club*, and was elected as an
Associate of the National Academy of Design*, and in 1933 to the status
of full academician
Submitted by Helen Nichols Jacobs, his daughter
* For more in-depth information about these terms and others, see
AskART.com Glossary
http://www.askart.com/AskART/lists/Art_Definition.aspx
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| ** If you discover credit omissions or have additional information to add, please let us know at registrar@AskART.com. |
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