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The Last of the Mohicans c. 1919. N. C. Wyeth [1882 – 1945]. Newell Converse Wyeth c.1920. Newell Convers Wyeth (October 22, 1882 – October 19, 1945), known as N.C. Wyeth , was an American artist and illustrator. Wyeth in his studio, 1903 or 1904.
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The Last of the Mohicansc. 1919 N. C. Wyeth [1882 – 1945]
Newell Convers Wyeth (October 22, 1882 – October 19, 1945), known as N.C. Wyeth, was an American artist and illustrator.
Newell Convers Wyeth was born in Needham, Massachusetts on October 22, 1882. His grandparents were Swiss immigrants and N.C. himself grew up on a farm surrounded by immigrant values and customs. • He attended Mechanic Arts High School in Boston through May 1899, concentrating on drafting.
With his mother's support he transferred to Massachusetts Normal Art School, and there instructor Richard Andrews urged him toward illustration. • His mother, Henriette Zirngiebel Wyeth, encouraged his artistic talent while conversely, his father Andrew Newell Wyeth II, called an artist's life "shiftless, almost criminal."
When two of his friends were accepted to Howard Pyle's School of Art in Wilmington, Delaware and Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, Wyeth was invited to try to join them in 1902. • Howard Pyle was the "father" of American illustration, and Wyeth immediately meshed with his methods and ideals. • Pyle’s approach included excursions to historical sites and impromptu dramas using props and costumes, meant to stimulate imagination, emotion, atmosphere, and the observation of humans in action—all necessities for his style of illustration. • Pyle stressed historical accuracy and tinged it with a romantic aura. • But where Pyle painted in exquisite detail, Wyeth veered toward looser, quicker strokes and relied on ominous shadows and moody backgrounds.
Wyeth’s exuberant personality and talent made him a standout student. • A robust, powerfully built young man with strangely delicate hands, he ate a lot less than his size implied. • He admired great literature, music, and drama, and he enjoyed spirited conversation.
Only five months after starting Pyle’s art school, A painting of a bucking bronco for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on February 21, 1903 was Wyeth's first commission as an illustrator. • That year he described his work as "true, solid American subjects–nothing foreign about them." Wyeth found early success producing illustrations for The Saturday Evening Post.
It was a spectacular accomplishment for the 21-year-old Wyeth, after just a few months under Pyle’s tutelage. • In 1904, the same magazine commissioned him to illustrate a Western story, and Pyle urged Wyeth to go West to acquire direct knowledge, much as Zane Grey had done for his Western novels.
In Colorado, he worked as a cowboy alongside the professional "punchers," moving cattle and doing ranch chores. • He visited the Navajo in Arizona and gained an understanding of Native American culture.
When his money was stolen, he worked as a mail carrier on horseback to gain back needed funds. • He wrote home, "The life is wonderful, strange—the fascination of it clutches me like some unseen animal—it seems to whisper, 'Come back, you belong here, this is your real home.' "
On a second trip two years later, he collected information on mining and brought home costumes and artifacts, including cowboy and Indian clothing. • His early trips to the western United States inspired a period of images of cowboys and Native Americans that dramatized the Old West. • His depictions of Native Americans tended to be sympathetic, showing them in harmony with their environment, as demonstrated by In the Crystal Depths (1906).
His three trips between 1904 and 1906 to the western United States inspired a period which produced illustrations of cowboys and Native Americans that dramatized the Old West. • Wyeth's travels were inspired by those of renowned American West artist, Frederic Remington, whom he had admired as a child.
Wyeth's pictures of Native Americans from this period show their unique and solitary relationship to nature. • One of his most popular was of a woodland Indian, titled, The Moose Call, painted in 1904. • Pictures from the "Indian in His Solitude Series" were printed in a 1907 issue of Outing magazine.
Upon returning to Chadds Ford, he painted a series of farm scenes for Scribner's, finding the landscape less dramatic than that of the West but nonetheless a rich environment for his art: “Everything lies in its subtleties, everything is so gentle and simple, so unaffected.” • His painting Mowing (1907), not done for illustration, was among the most successful images of rural life, rivaling Winslow Homer's great scenes of Americana
Howard Pyle • In 1894 he began teaching illustration at the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry in Philadelphia (now Drexel University), • After 1900 he founded his own school of art and illustration called the Howard Pyle School of Illustration Art. • The term the Brandywine School was later applied to the illustration artists and Wyeth family artists of the Brandywine region (later called the Brandywine School) • Pyle is considered the Father of Illustration.
Pyle was one of the country's most renowned illustrators. • Wyeth was the star pupil of artist Howard Pyle and became one of America's greatest illustrators.
Howard Pyle • His 1883 classic The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood remains in print to this day, and his other books, frequently with medieval European settings, include a four-volume set on King Arthur that cemented his reputation. • He wrote an original novel, Otto of the Silver Hand, in 1888. • He also illustrated historical and adventure stories for periodicals such as Harper's Weekly and St. Nicholas Magazine. • His novel Men of Iron was made into a movie in 1954, The Black Shield of Falworth.
While studying with Pyle, Wyeth met his future wife, Carolyn Bockius, whose family lived three blocks from the Pyle Studios on Gilpin Avenue. • According to Wyeth's biographer, "By all accounts she was the prettiest girl in Wilmington."
N.C. Wyeth • In 1906, Wyeth married Carolyn Brenneman Bockius of Wilmington. • The couple lived for a short time in the city, but moved in 1908 to Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, 10 miles north of Wilmington along the Brandywine Creek.
Chadds Ford had been the site of Pyle's summer school, and the rolling hills and sycamore trees of the Brandywine Valley had already exerted a profound influence on Wyeth, subduing his enthusiasm for the rough and tumble west.
In 1911, the Wyeths purchased 18 acres of property in Chadds Ford, not far from a Revolutionary War battlefield. • The proximity appealed to the artist's abiding love of history.
Immediately the Wyeths set about to build a house and studio. • They would raise five talented children on this property. • The valley landscape would become almost sacred to the displaced New England
N.C. Wyeth created a stimulating household for his talented children Andrew Wyeth, Henriette Wyeth Hurd, Carolyn Wyeth, Ann Wyeth McCoy, and Nathaniel C. Wyeth. • Wyeth was very sociable, and frequent visitors included F. Scott Fitzgerald, Joseph Hergesheimer, Hugh Walpole, Lillian Gish, and John Gilbert. • According to Andrew, who spent the most time with his father on account of his sickly childhood, N.C. was a strict but patient father who did not talk down to his children. • His hard work as an illustrator gave his family the financial freedom to follow their own artistic and scientific pursuits. Andrew went on to become one of the foremost American artists of the second half of the 20th century, and both Henriette and Carolyn became artists also; Ann became an artist and composer. Nathaniel became an engineer for DuPont and worked on the team that invented the plastic soda bottle. Henriette and Ann married two of N.C.'s protégés, Peter Hurd and John W. McCoy. • N.C. Wyeth is the grandfather of artist Jamie Wyeth and musician Howard Wyeth.
By now, he had left Pyle, and commissions were coming in quickly. • His hope had been that he would make enough money with his illustrations to be able to afford the luxury of painting what he wanted; but as his family and income grew, he found it difficult to break from illustration.
In 1911, the publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons engaged Wyeth to illustrate Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island, his first commission in Scribner's popular series of classic stories. • The 17 paintings that make up the set are masterpieces of American illustration.
One More Step, Mr. Hands by N.C. Wyeth, 1911, for Treasure Island
Their size and scale, unusual in illustrations of the period, give the paintings a heroic quality that is apparent even in the greatly reduced reproductions. • Within the set of illustrations, Wyeth brilliantly mixed subject matter. • Action and character study are united in each painting to further the narrative beyond the text.
In every canvas, Wyeth's superb sense of color and his ability to mix painterly passages with authentic detail prove him a master of the art. • Complex compositions and his skillful use of intense light contrasted with deep shadow contribute to a palpable dramatic tension inherent in the paintings and not dependent on the text. • These pictures made the Wyeth-illustrated edition of Treasure Island a favorite of generations of readers.
The success of Treasure Island insured Wyeth a long career with Scribner's, illustrating in succeeding years many classic stories.
Wyeth’s most famous titles • Kidnapped(1913), • The Black Arrow (1916), • The Boy's King Arthur (1917), • The Mysterious Island (1918), • The Last of the Mohicans (1919), • The Deerslayer (1925), • The Yearling (1939).
He also created illustrations for other publishers, for books • Robin Hood (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1917); • Robinson Crusoe (New York: Cosmopolitan, 1920); • Rip Van Winkle (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1921); • Men of Concord (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1936); • Trending Into Maine (Boston: Little, Brown, 1938).
During the Golden Age of Illustration • During his lifetime, Wyeth created over 3,000 paintings and illustrated 112 books • 25 of them for Scribner's, which is the work for which he is best-known. • Another source creates him with nearly 4,000 works over a period from 1903 to 1945.
The Last of the Mohicans • An American adventure tale by James Fenimore Cooper, became an instant best-seller when it was published in 1826. • Its popularity continued, and by 1919, when N. C. Wyeth illustrated a new, deluxe edition of the book, Cooper’s story had become a fixture in American boyhood.
It has since fallen out of fashion, but its importance to American literature is firmly established: • the protagonist, Natty Bumppo (called Hawkeye), a white scout raised by American Indians, is the first of many enterprising pioneer heroes to overcome the perils of the frontier.
And even though The Last of the Mohicanshad been illustrated before, Wyeth’s pictures did much to create an enduring image of the American Indian as a “noble savage.”
