Hawthorne & the Mudheads:
The Exhibit Collection
This marks the beginning of Provincetown as an art colony. This exhibit features the works of the teachers Hawthorne (Cape Cod School of Art), Webster (Summer School of Painting) and Browne (West End School of Art); their contemporaries Dickinson, Diehl and Hensche; their faithful assistants John Frazier and Oscar Gieberich; the well-known students Zaring, Rayner and Rumsey; and the unknown students whose works were found in the walls of Henry Hensche's studio which he used as insulation to keep the cold outside during the harsh Provincetown winters.
Hawthorne is equally renowned for his work with oils in his portrait work as well as in this pastel masterpiece, Rooftops.
Following his own unique theory of plein air painting, Hawthorne posed the model in dazzling sunlight with the face shaded by hat or parasol and forced his students to create form with light and shadow and blotches of color which changed with the passing light. Tourists coined the term mud head or mudders for these student studies as the face was devoid of detail and often a brownish wash. - Julie Heller
"Trawlers, open boats with motor attachments, fishermen in khaki and oilskins, bright sunlight, busy little blue waves, the tang of the sea-one can almost smell it! -the hurry and bustle of the busy harbor, all are found in the big water colors and oils. Mr. Browne's versatility is also shown in his landscapes, which he paints with facility and charm." - American Art News, Vol. 15, No. 18 (Feb. 10, 1917)
"See color. Paint sunshine." were taglines for Webster's Summer School of Painting early advertising campaigns. He was one of the earliest settlers in the colony landing in 1898 and opening his school in the summer of 1900. He was also one of the town's pioneer Modernist painters. His work was exhibited at the 1913 Armory Show. He was a co-founder of the Provincetown Art Association & Museum (PAAM) 1n 1914.
"I started a school for the same reason all painters do. I have an analytic mind and when I know something that I think will help someone else, I like to pass it on." - Webster 1919
Gieberich studied with Charles Hawthorne at the Art Students League in New York and would soon join him in Provincetown where Oscar served as his class monitor at the Cape Cod School of Art. He was a co-founder of the Provincetown Art Association & Museum (PAAM) 1n 1914. He would later marry fellow artist, Richard Miller's daughter.
"Gieberich was called Oscar by Hawthorne but everyone else called him Gub - Houghton Cranston Smith - 1963
Dickinson had an erudite air about him and had Errol Flynn good looks but by all accounts the man was an upstanding and well-respected character. His greatest work is dark and brooding suggesting otherwise. Dick first arrived in 1911. He spent the summers of 1912 and 1913 studying with Charles Hawthorne, and continued there as a year-rounder from 1913 through 1916. He spent 1914 working as Hawthorne's assistant.
While watercolors dominated his early profession, this passion quickly gave way to oil painting or “pure painting” as Provincetown mentor, Charles Hawthorne described. From 1919 until Hawthorne’s death in 1930, Frazier was determined to master his craft. (BERT)
Diehl was born in London, England, but for most of his career, he lived in Provincetown, Massachusetts. His legend is that of raconteur, carnival barker and artist. He became a street attraction where one could watch him paint a piece and buy it thereafter all the meanwhile being entertained by his storytelling gift. He stayed out of the galleries as a pioneer in the direct-to-consumer business model. His output was prolific yet proficient, leaving behind one of Provincetown's most important maps to the past.
Known locally as 'The Etcher' William Bicknell's Provincetown prints have become part of the town's historical record. Works in the gallery include a view of the first Provincetown Playhouse (at Race Point), portraits of artists at work on the dunes, and a scene of men cutting ice at Shank Painter Pond.
Ada moved to Provincetown, MA with the goal of furthering her art studies. There she built her own home at 12 Conwell St (then known as Beach Road) with the help of friends. She eventually met Henry Hensche and they were married in 1936. Ada was known for her garden and many floral paintings. Later in life she did imaginative figure paintings of women and children.(FIND-A-GRAVE)
A native of Buffalo, Evelyn Rumsey Lord studied at the Albright Art School with Edwin Dickinson and at the Art Students’ League in New York with Robert Henri. She and her brother, Charles were childhood friends with the Armory Show's Mabel Dodge and both brother and sister hanged work at the actual show. During summers she studied Provincetown, Massachusetts and Maine.
Fast forward a hundred years to the discovery of over a hundred of these Mudheads found nailed into the walls of Hawthorne's barn as insulation. Several of these form the bulk of the May show at Julie Heller Gallery
Fast forward a hundred years to the discovery of over a hundred of these Mudheads found nailed into the walls of Hawthorne's barn as insulation. Several of these form the bulk of the May show at Julie Heller Gallery
In the summer of 1911 Zaring took lessons at the John Herron School of Art in Indianapolis under Forsyth. She also studied at the Cape Cod School of Art under Charles Webster Hawthorne. (WIKI)
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