The patroon painters were a group of painters active in what is now New York State in the early 18th century. There were between six and seven patroon painters.[1] Baigell describes the patroon style as "a manner notable for marvelous flat-patterned clothing enlivened by assertive diagonals and vertical, broad curving planes, and simple color combinations".[1] The patroon painters are sometimes described as the first American school of art.[2]

Susanna Truax (1730), attributed to either Pieter Vanderlyn or the "Gansevoort Limner".

Named after the patroons, a Dutch landowning class, the painters were active in the Hudson Valley, in cities including Schenectady, Albany, and Kingston, from roughly 1700 to 1750.[3][4] The historian James Thomas Flexner coined the term "patroon painter" in his 1945 study First Flowers of Our Wilderness, the first volume of a history of American painting.[4] The earliest painting identified as a patroon painting is dated to 1718.[5]

Some patroon paintings are thought to be the work of Pieter Vanderlyn,[6] and another painter named the "Gansevoort Limner" has also been identified with the school.[7] (The Gansevoort Limner, in turn, is sometimes identified with Vanderlyn.[8]) Patroon painters are known mainly for portraits.[9] Ruby notes that patroon painting is often thought to be influenced by English portrait painting—itself influenced by earlier Dutch antecedents.[10]

References

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  1. ^ a b Baigell, Matthew (1971). A History of American Painting. Praeger Publishers. p. 30. OCLC 1035595311.
  2. ^ Ruby 2008, pp. 27–28.
  3. ^ Vlach 1988, p. 107.
  4. ^ a b Ebert & Ebert 1975, p. 23.
  5. ^ Ruby 2008, p. 28.
  6. ^ Ebert & Ebert 1975, p. 24.
  7. ^ Morgan, Ann Lee, ed. (2007). The Oxford Dictionary of American Art and Artists. Oxford University Press. p. 283. ISBN 978-0-19-989150-4. OCLC 181102756.
  8. ^ Caldwell, John; Roque, Oswaldo Rodriguez; Johnson, Dale T. (March 1, 1994). American Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 1. Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 10. ISBN 0-870-99244-9.
  9. ^ Vlach 1988, p. 108.
  10. ^ Ruby 2008, pp. 27, 44.

Sources

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