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Lilla Cabot Perry was a close confidante of Monet, considered Pissarro among her nearest and dearest, and published four books of poetry.
Lilla Cabot Perry may not have been a Matisse fan, but she did keep a close circle of artistic confidants. From childhood, her socialite family surrounded her with luminaries like Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson, with whom she exercised her considerable wit and played rounds of “fox and geese.” Perry’s early artistic ambition was wholly her own, though it’s a pity we can’t all share our childhoods with frontrunners of the transcendentalist movement.
Inspired by the Impressionists, an adult Perry rented a Giverny residence. Lilla’s new neighbor was the distinguished Claude Monet, from whom Lilla received much more than the occasional cup of sugar. Monet kindly supplied his new acquaintance with gardening tips and artistic know-how. Unfortunately, Lilla’s elegant prose and artistic chops would never win her quite as much fame as her stories of Monet as she knew him.
Eager to worm her way into Lilla’s star-studded social circle, Isabella Stewart Gardner (of the eponymous Boston art museum) wrote her requesting a visit. Perry’s husband Thomas considered Gardner a bit of a leach, noting that the wealthy art patron was secretly thirsting for a visit with Monet. Lilla let her pettier nature show, planning a family cycling trip for the duration of Gardner’s stay in Paris. Unfortunately, Gardner was not one to take a social cue. She badgered Lilla until she relented. Monet was annoyed by Gardner’s insistence, but used her enthusiasm as a chance to peddle a few Pissarro paintings. Unfortunately, Gardner took the visit and refused the paintings, leaving poor Pissarro’s dire financial straits unchanged.
Perry’s later years were plagued with challenges; her daughter Edith was sent to a sanitarium, and her own health failed her as she fell ill with diphtheria. Perry’s visitors and guests, however, would always remember her at her best: painting in a house of tea, toast, and intellect.
Sources
Sources
- Kort, Carol and Liz Sonneborn. A to Z of American Women in the Visual Arts. New York: Facts on File, 2002.
- “Lilla Cabot Perry.” Wikipedia. August 23, 2018. Accessed August 31, 2018. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilla_Cabot_Perry.
- Madeline, Laurence. Women Artists in Paris, 1850-1900. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017.
- Micucci, Dana. Artists in Residence. New York: The Little Bookroom, 2001.
- “Ralph Waldo Emerson.” Wikipedia. August 27, 2018. Accessed August 31, 2018. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Waldo_Emerson.
- Rennella, Mark. The Boston Cosmopolitans: International Travel and American Arts and Letters, 1865–1915. New York: Springer, 2008.
- Sheola, Noah. “Lilla Cabot Perry.” Boston Athenaeum. September, 2012. Accessed August 31, 2018. https://www.bostonathenaeum.org/library/book-recommendations/athenaeum-….
- Southgate, M. Therese. The Art of JAMA: Covers and Essays from The Journal of the American Medical Association, Volume 3. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
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Here is what Wikipedia says about Lilla Cabot Perry
Lilla Cabot Perry (born Lydia Cabot; January 13, 1848 – February 28, 1933) was an American artist who worked in the American Impressionist style, rendering portraits and landscapes in the free form manner of her mentor, Claude Monet. Perry was an early advocate of the French Impressionist style and contributed to its reception in the United States. Perry's early work was shaped by her exposure to the Boston School of artists and her travels in Europe and Japan. She was also greatly influenced by Ralph Waldo Emerson's philosophies and her friendship with Camille Pissarro. Although it was not until the age of thirty-six that Perry received formal training, her work with artists of the Impressionist, Realist, Symbolist, and German Social Realist movements greatly affected the style of her oeuvre.
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