American, 1796 - 1886
Asher B. Durand displayed his artistic talents early with his engraving work on the watches and silver that his father manufactured. In 1812 he was apprenticed to the engraver Peter Maverick in Newark, New Jersey. He so excelled in the medium that after completing his apprenticeship in 1817, Maverick immediately made him his partner; Durand established an office for the firm in New York. His only "training" in art came at this time, when he would occasionally draw from the casts at the American Academy of Fine Arts.
In 1820 John Trumbull hired Durand to engrave his painting The Signing of the Declaration of Independence (1786-97, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven). Relations with Maverick became strained as Durand's skills gained admirers, and when this major commission went independently to the junior partner, Maverick dissolved their association. Durand completed the large plate reproducing Trumbull's painting in 1823; its publication the same year brought him immediate acclaim and established him as one of the leading engravers working in the United States.
Durand then went into business for himself, maintaining a firm until 1831 under various partnership names, producing banknotes, book illustrations, and especially engravings after portraits of celebrated men. He continued to work in engraving, executing nineteen of the plates for The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans, published between 1832 and 1840, but his last significant effort in the medium came in 1834. In 1831 Durand had purchased John Vanderlyn's remarkable painting of the female nude, Ariadne Asleep on the Island of Naxos (1814, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia). He made his engraving after it using his own small-sized oil copy as well as Vanderlyn's original as models. The print, published in 1835, was immediately recognized as his finest engraving.
In the same year the assured patronage of Luman Reed allowed Durand to turn fully to painting. Working as a painter was not new to Durand. Although professionally identified in the Academy's publication of its founding and its first exhibition catalogue as an engraver, Durand contributed portrait and landscape paintings along with his engravings to its first six annual exhibitions (1826-32). When he gave up engraving in the mid-1830s, he concentrated on painting portraits. But in the summer of 1837 he determined to focus on landscapes, following the leadership of Thomas Cole in idealistic interpretations of that subject and becoming the other major figure in the group of artists commonly called the Hudson River School. In 1837 he began the landscape painter's habit of spending at least part of each summer traveling to scenic locales to sketch subjects for later development; he made the first of many such excursions with Cole. Durand continued contributing a few portraits among many landscapes to Academy annuals through 1844. But thereafter, until his last participation in an annual fifty years later, he showed only landscapes.
Durand, Thomas Seir Cummings, John Frazee, Henry Inman, and Samuel F. B. Morse formed the core of activist artists seeking substantive change in the art establishment of New York; their efforts resulted in the founding of the National Academy of Design in 1826. Vitally involved in the Academy, Durand was a member of the Council from that body's establishment in December 1826 to 1828 and served the Council as recording secretary from 1832 to 1838. Following a year spent abroad, predominantly in Italy, he was returned to the Council for the year 1842-43. In 1844 he was elected vice-president and the next year succeeded Morse as the Academy's second president, a position he held until 1861.
In the spring of 1869, Durand left New York for a home and studio he had newly built on the family's land in Jefferson Village. There he continued to paint for another nine years and to live for an additional eight. At its first meeting of the season, on October 18, 1886, the earliest opportunity following Durand's death, the Council passed a lengthy resolution of respect.
At the Academicians' next annual meeting, on May 11, 1887, President Daniel Huntington included a formal eulogy in his annual address:
[block quote:]
The death of the venerable ex-President Asher B. Durand on the 17th of September last, at the age of ninety, is a memorable event in the history of our Institution, as well as of the Arts of our country. In early life he obtained a high reputation as an engraver, and the admiration his prints received from his contemporaries has suffered no diminution as those works have been compared, critically, with the masterpieces of earlier or of recent times. The admirably engraved portraits of Colden; of Dr. Mason; of Washington (for the "Life," by Jared Sparks); of Marshall; of Carroll, Trumbull and many others, maintain their supremacy and take rank with the greatest examples in that department. His principal work "The Ariadne," from Vanderlyn's famous painting, is still, and must always be, a delight to all who can appreciate beauty and grace of lines; this delicate expression of form; the sweet diffusion of light; the tremendous depth of shadow and that combination of softness and subtlety, with precision and force in the execution, which renders this engraving one of the masterpieces of modern times. Time would fail to give an adequate expression to the long and interesting career of this distinguished artist. For many years his principal works in landscape were objects of attraction in our Exhibitions and are now treasured in collections. It is not generally known that he was the first of our landscape painters who habitually made exact and finished studies from nature in the fields. Our earlier landscape painters were contented to make drawings in pencil, often with written hints descriptive of the color or effects; or at best slight water-color, or tepid drawings as material to work from. Durand was a resolute pioneer in a practice, which has been followed by most of our Artists, and which has contributed so greatly to the pre-eminent merit of our Landscape Art. For several of his latter years, Durand had ceased to paint, saying that his hand would not obey his wish. His last work was a recollection of a sunset over an Adirondack lake, in which, the gentle radiance of a declining sun, aptly prefigured his own peaceful departure to another world.
In 1820 John Trumbull hired Durand to engrave his painting The Signing of the Declaration of Independence (1786-97, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven). Relations with Maverick became strained as Durand's skills gained admirers, and when this major commission went independently to the junior partner, Maverick dissolved their association. Durand completed the large plate reproducing Trumbull's painting in 1823; its publication the same year brought him immediate acclaim and established him as one of the leading engravers working in the United States.
Durand then went into business for himself, maintaining a firm until 1831 under various partnership names, producing banknotes, book illustrations, and especially engravings after portraits of celebrated men. He continued to work in engraving, executing nineteen of the plates for The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans, published between 1832 and 1840, but his last significant effort in the medium came in 1834. In 1831 Durand had purchased John Vanderlyn's remarkable painting of the female nude, Ariadne Asleep on the Island of Naxos (1814, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia). He made his engraving after it using his own small-sized oil copy as well as Vanderlyn's original as models. The print, published in 1835, was immediately recognized as his finest engraving.
In the same year the assured patronage of Luman Reed allowed Durand to turn fully to painting. Working as a painter was not new to Durand. Although professionally identified in the Academy's publication of its founding and its first exhibition catalogue as an engraver, Durand contributed portrait and landscape paintings along with his engravings to its first six annual exhibitions (1826-32). When he gave up engraving in the mid-1830s, he concentrated on painting portraits. But in the summer of 1837 he determined to focus on landscapes, following the leadership of Thomas Cole in idealistic interpretations of that subject and becoming the other major figure in the group of artists commonly called the Hudson River School. In 1837 he began the landscape painter's habit of spending at least part of each summer traveling to scenic locales to sketch subjects for later development; he made the first of many such excursions with Cole. Durand continued contributing a few portraits among many landscapes to Academy annuals through 1844. But thereafter, until his last participation in an annual fifty years later, he showed only landscapes.
Durand, Thomas Seir Cummings, John Frazee, Henry Inman, and Samuel F. B. Morse formed the core of activist artists seeking substantive change in the art establishment of New York; their efforts resulted in the founding of the National Academy of Design in 1826. Vitally involved in the Academy, Durand was a member of the Council from that body's establishment in December 1826 to 1828 and served the Council as recording secretary from 1832 to 1838. Following a year spent abroad, predominantly in Italy, he was returned to the Council for the year 1842-43. In 1844 he was elected vice-president and the next year succeeded Morse as the Academy's second president, a position he held until 1861.
In the spring of 1869, Durand left New York for a home and studio he had newly built on the family's land in Jefferson Village. There he continued to paint for another nine years and to live for an additional eight. At its first meeting of the season, on October 18, 1886, the earliest opportunity following Durand's death, the Council passed a lengthy resolution of respect.
At the Academicians' next annual meeting, on May 11, 1887, President Daniel Huntington included a formal eulogy in his annual address:
[block quote:]
The death of the venerable ex-President Asher B. Durand on the 17th of September last, at the age of ninety, is a memorable event in the history of our Institution, as well as of the Arts of our country. In early life he obtained a high reputation as an engraver, and the admiration his prints received from his contemporaries has suffered no diminution as those works have been compared, critically, with the masterpieces of earlier or of recent times. The admirably engraved portraits of Colden; of Dr. Mason; of Washington (for the "Life," by Jared Sparks); of Marshall; of Carroll, Trumbull and many others, maintain their supremacy and take rank with the greatest examples in that department. His principal work "The Ariadne," from Vanderlyn's famous painting, is still, and must always be, a delight to all who can appreciate beauty and grace of lines; this delicate expression of form; the sweet diffusion of light; the tremendous depth of shadow and that combination of softness and subtlety, with precision and force in the execution, which renders this engraving one of the masterpieces of modern times. Time would fail to give an adequate expression to the long and interesting career of this distinguished artist. For many years his principal works in landscape were objects of attraction in our Exhibitions and are now treasured in collections. It is not generally known that he was the first of our landscape painters who habitually made exact and finished studies from nature in the fields. Our earlier landscape painters were contented to make drawings in pencil, often with written hints descriptive of the color or effects; or at best slight water-color, or tepid drawings as material to work from. Durand was a resolute pioneer in a practice, which has been followed by most of our Artists, and which has contributed so greatly to the pre-eminent merit of our Landscape Art. For several of his latter years, Durand had ceased to paint, saying that his hand would not obey his wish. His last work was a recollection of a sunset over an Adirondack lake, in which, the gentle radiance of a declining sun, aptly prefigured his own peaceful departure to another world.
