Sarah Choate Sears

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Portrait Sarah Choate Sears by John Singer Sargent , 1889

Sarah Carlisle Choate Sears (born May 5, 1858 in Cambridge , Massachusetts , † September 25, 1935 in Gouldsboro , Maine ) was an American photographer , painter , art collector and patron .

Life

Sarah Carlisle Choate was the daughter of Charles Francis and Elizabeth Carlisle Choate. Her family belonged to the so-called " Brahmins of Boston ". From 1876 she studied painting at the Cowles Art School in Boston and art history at the Museum of Fine Arts . In 1877 she married the landowner Joshua Montgomery Sears, one of the wealthiest men in Boston at the time. Marriage enabled her to live a carefree life so that she could devote herself solely to her own interests.

She finished her art studies and became a successful watercolorist who won numerous awards. She exhibited at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 , the World Exposition in Paris in 1900 , the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo in 1901 and at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904 in St. Louis .

In 1890 she discovered photography for herself and soon exhibited in photographic salons. In 1892 she became a member of the Boston Camera Club , where Fred Holland Day became aware of her still lifes and portrait studies. Around 1900 Sears befriended the American impressionist Mary Cassatt , at the same time she was accepted into the elite Brotherhood of the Linked Ring in London and Alfred Stieglitz 's Photo-Secession in New York .

With the illness of her husband from 1904 Sears interrupted her artistic activities. After his death in the following year, she devoted herself to family business. Over the next few years she toured Europe with Cassatt and Gertrude Stein , where she lived a glamorous lifestyle as an art collector and surrounded herself with numerous artists, musicians and writers. She mainly collected works by Edgar Degas and Édouard Manet . She later donated her collection to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

At the suggestion of Alfred Stieglitz, she also collected works by Georges Braque , Paul Cézanne , Arthur B. Davies , Henri Matisse and Maurice Prendergast . She developed a special fondness for Prendergast, enabling the artist to exhibit in Boston and financing a study trip to Europe for him.

In 1907, two photographs by Sarah Choate Sears were published in Alfred Stieglitz's photo magazine Camera Work : Mary (1907) and Mrs. Julia Ward Howe ( Camera Work # 18). By then, however, she had largely lost her interest in photography. In the later years of her life she rarely took photos and instead devoted herself to watercolor painting.

Sarah Choate Sears died on September 25, 1935 in West Gouldsboro, Maine.

Photographic work

  • William James
    about 1890

  • Young woman with lilies
    around 1892

  • Ramona
    1893

  • John Singer Sargent
    1895

  • Mrs. Julia Ward Howe
    1907
    (published in Camera Work number 18)

  • Mary
    1907
    (published in Camera Work number 18)

literature

  • Stephanie M. Buck: Sarah Choate Sears: Artist, Photographer and Art Patron. Syracuse University, 1985 (English).
  • Charlotte Gere, Marina Vaizey: Great Women Collectors. Philip Wilson Publishers, 1999, ISBN 0-85667-503-2 (English).

Web links

Commons : Sarah Choate Sears  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Kathleen McCarthy, Women's Culture: American Philanthropy and Art. University of Chicago Press, 1991, p. 106
personal data
SURNAME Sears, Sarah Choate
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sears, Sarah Carlisle Choate (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American photographer, painter, art collector and patron
DATE OF BIRTH May 5, 1858
PLACE OF BIRTH Cambridge , Massachusetts
DATE OF DEATH September 25, 1935
Place of death Gouldsboro , Maine