Ellen Day Hale

Ellen Day Hale was an American Impressionist painter and printmaker from Boston. She studied art in Paris and during her adult life lived in Paris, London and Boston. She exhibited at the Paris Salon and the Royal Academy of Arts. Hale wrote the book History of Art: A Study of the Lives of Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian, and Albrecht Dürer and mentored the next generation of New England female artists, paving the way for widespread acceptance of female artists.

Hale was an Impressionist painter, best known for her figure paintings, including many portraits and self-portraits. She made sophisticated, aesthetic paintings with good command of light, shadow and technical skill. She exhibited at the Boston Art Club in 1876. In Europe, she lived in London and Paris, where she exhibited at Paris Salon in 1885 her paintings An Old Retainer and Un Hiver Americain. In London's Royal Academy of Arts, she exhibited A New England Girl. In the United States she lived in Boston, and her work is associated with the Boston School. She made increasingly Impressionistic paintings, but like "many of her Boston colleagues, she did not compromise her dedication to painting the human form." Hale was very active in exhibiting her work, but only achieved marginal recognition of her art.

From 1918 to 1940, Hale and Clements wintered in Charleston, South Carolina, a city that was experiencing a burgeoning arts renaissance. Hale was fascinated by the local culture, as seen in the work she created during these residencies. She and Clements assisted in the organization of the Charleston Etchers' Club, a group established in 1923 to offer instruction on printmaking, encourage intellectual exchange, art criticism, and exhibition planning. Founding members of the club include Charleston Renaissance artists Elizabeth O'Neill Verner, Alfred Hutty, and Alice Ravenel Huger Smith. According to Verner's daughter, Hale and Clements stated: "We want to leave Charleston some of our skills... Get together a group so you can buy a press and we will show you how to use it... We'll teach you, so you can teach them."Hale exhibited her work at the Palace of Fine Arts at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois.

Text courtesy of Wikipedia, 2023