Page:An Elementary History of Art.djvu/689

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In America. 659 of his time- He was especially noted for his crayon drawings. William Morris Hunt (1824 — 1879), a man of versatile talents, but a better draughtsman than colourist, was a native of Brattleborough, Vermont. He first studied sculp- ture at Diisseldorf, and then entered the studio of Couture in Paris, but soon became much impressed by the work of Jean Francois Millet, whose pictures he bought and whose subjects and style he appreciated. In 1855 Hunt returned to America, and after a stay at Newport, settled at Boston, where he afterwards resided and became celebrated for his genre subjects, but more especially for his landscapes and his portraits, and where he had great influence on the rising artists of the day. In 1878 he began and completed the decoration of two great walls in the Senate-Chamber of the new Capitol at Albany. Among his best works are the Prodigal Son, the Fortune- Teller, the Violet Girl, and the Flight of Night, his master-piece. He occasionally lithographed from his own designs. In 1865 a collection of English water-colour paintings, which was taken to New York and there exhibited, aroused a strong feeling in favour of that medium in America. A Water-Colour Society was soon started, and that branch of art now holds a permanent and important position among the painters of the New World. While the exhibition of the recently-formed Society of Painter- Etchers in London proved that the American artists are likely to become formidable rivals of their European brethren in the use of the etching needle. In conclusion, we may briefly point out that Art in u u 2