Willard Leroy Metcalf (1858 - 1925)

Cornish Hills, 1911

Willard Leroy Metcalf is born July 1, 1858 in Lowell, Massachusetts, United States. He is a son of Greenleaf Willard Metcalf and Margaret Jane Gallop.^[1][2][3]

Metcalf begins painting in 1874. In 1876 he opens a studio in Boston, and receives a scholarship at the Boston Museum school, where he studies until 1878. In 1882 he holds an exhibition at the J. Eastman Chase Gallery in Boston.

Metcalf leaves for Europe in September 1883, and does not return to the United States until late 1888. During that time he travels and paints, studying first in Paris, subsequently going to England and Pont-Aven, Brittany. Soon thereafter he travels to Algeria and Tunisia, returning to Giverny in the summers of 1887 and 1888, in the company of other American painters.

On the Suffolk Coast, 1885

Upon his return to the United States Metcalf has a solo exhibition at the St. Botolph Club in Boston. After living briefly in Philadelphia, in 1890 he opens a studio in New York, working for several years as a portrait painter, illustrator, and teacher. In 1895 he paints at Gloucester, Massachusetts, and ceases to work as an illustrator. In the late 1890s he appears to have painted little, and his contributions to the first few exhibitions of The Ten were disappointing. At the time Metcalf led a lavish social life that included heavy drinking.

Metcalf's model for the murals is Marguerite Beaufort Hailé, whom he marries on September 11, 1903 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States.^[4]

Metcalf travels to Havana, Cuba in 1902, to make painted studies. That year he also produces a series of notable landscapes. In 1904 he resides and paints steadily in Clark's Cove, Maine. By 1905, he begins summering in Old Lyme, working as both painter and teacher, and holds successful exhibitions in New York and again at the St. Botolph Club.

May Night, 1906

In 1907, May Night wins the Corcoran gold medal. It remains one of best works and is now in the collections of the National Gallery of Art. In the same year his marriage to Marguerite dissolves when she eloped from Old Lyme with one of Metcalf's male students.

Metcalf frequently visits the Cornish Art Colony, between 1909 and 1921.

Metcalf returns faithfully for many winters, and at least one summer after that.

He marries Henrietta Alice McCrea on January 10, 1911 in Chicago, Cook, Illinois, United States.^[5] Together they have two children: Rosalind and Addison.^[6]

Metcalf continues to hold one-man shows in New York and Boston. During the 1910s he travels incessantly in search of painting sites. In 1913 he spends nine months painting in Paris, Norway, England, and Italy; in the U.S., in addition to Cornish and Plainfield, New Hampshire, Metcalf lives and paints in Connecticut, Vermont, and Maine, where in 1920 he paints Benediction (now lost), a nocturne. In 1923 the painting sold for $13,000, then a record price for the work of a living American artist.

His familial strife continue, he and Henrietta divorced in 1920, which spurs a period of drinking and decreased productivity. However, he rebounds and paints for a number of years in Vermont.

Metcalf dies March 9, 1925 in Manhattan, New York, New York, United States of a heart attack.^[7] His ashes were scattered in Cornish, New Hampshire, by his longtime friend Charles Platt.

Sources

1. ↑ Massachusetts State Census, 1865, Willard Metcalf in entry for Greenleaf W Metcalf, 1865; Newton, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
2. ↑ United States Census, 1870, Millard Metcalf in entry for Millard Metcalf, 1870; Cambridge, ward 4, Middlesex, Massachusetts, United States.
3. ↑ United States Census, 1880, Willard L Metcalf in household of G W Metcalf, Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts, United States; citing enumeration district ED 442, sheet 213C.
4. ↑ New York Marriages, 1686-1980, Willard L. Metcalf, 1903; Manhattan, New York, New York, United States.
5. ↑ Illinois, Cook County Marriages, 1871-1920, Willard L. Metcalf and Henrietta Alice Mccrea, 10 Jan 1911.
6. ↑ United States Census, 1920, Willard L Metcalf, Manhattan Assembly District 7, New York, New York, United States; citing ED 566, sheet 7A, line 5, family 137.
7. ↑ New York, New York City Municipal Deaths, 1795-1949 Willard Leroy Metcalf, 1925; Manhattan, New York, New York, United States.

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