Jerome Myers
Encyclopedia
Jerome Myers was a U.S.
artist and writer. Born in Petersburg, Virginia
and raised in Philadelphia, Trenton
and Baltimore, he spent his adult life in New York City
. Jerome worked briefly as an actor and scene painter, then studied art at Cooper Union
and the Art Students League where his main teacher was George de Forest Brush
. In 1896 and 1914, he was in Paris, but his main classroom was the streets of New York's lower East Side
. His strong interest and feelings for the new immigrants and their life resulted in hundreds of drawings, as well as paintings, etchings and watercolors capturing the whole panorama of their lives as found outside of the crowded tenements which were their first homes in America.
purchased the painting "Street Group," from the Municipal Art Exhibition in Rockefeller Center. The Herald Tribune said in reporting the story that "the painting by Mr. Myers is of a group of women standing talking in a somber street, with children playing about them. Mr. Myers considers it typical of his work, and says it is the sort of scene he most enjoys to paint. 'Old streets and old houses and the people who live in them,' he explained."
"I am trying to catch the New York that is passing," he said. "I painted that down on Delancey Street seven or eight years ago and already the scene has changed in spirit. I want to get it before it is gone."
Twenty two years earlier, in 1912, a major event had taken place in Jerome Myers' life. The occasion was when the Metropolitan Museum of Art first decided to purchase a painting of his titled "The Mission Tent." Here is a quote from the Metropolitan Museum Bulletin in June 1913 talking about their purchase: "Jerome Myers for several years has been showing New Yorkers the artistic possibilities of what is perhaps the unique part of the city's scenes. He has discovered these subjects for himself and treats them in his own way. It is never the exciting moments of street life that move him, only the daily happenings, the usual things that all may see. Boys and girls playing in the square, the crowd at a recreation pier, an organ-grinder followed by a troop of dancing children, old people whom the night freshness lures to the park-bench or the wharf, a religious festival in Little Italy
—these are his favorite themes and he renders them with loving sincerity and a profound appreciation of their significance."
Not only was the sale to the Metropolitan a great honor then, but it also provided him with enough money to move his family from their small studio into a studio in the "new" Carnegie Hall
. Over the years, with all the moving around to various studios, he always came back to Carnegie as his real home and in 1940 it was where he passed away with his friends around him. He could not have been in a more perfect place.
The lower East Side, with its crowded tenements and struggling immigrants, knew him best and was recorded in hundreds of sketches which were later transcribed onto soft-toned canvases. The poor seems to bring forth Myers’ deepest feelings, but he did not paint them because they and their environment were ugly; he saw the beauty of their humble lives, and on his canvases he has caught that beauty...During those 50 years the cobblestones that Myers used to tramp were smoothed to asphalt pavements, the city’s center of activity crept northward leaving in its wake new, pristine skyscrapers; gas lamps gave way to neon, but the poor remained.
Though Myers later achieved wide honors—he was elected to the Academy and awarded such important prizes as the Altman, the Carnegie and the Isidor Medal—he suffered from neglect in recent years. Forgotten, for the most part, were Myers’ distinctive contributions to our native art and the battles he has fought for art freedom...Last year, as the end neared, Myers looked back on a long and fruitful life and wrote a most interesting autobiography, Artist in Manhattan (American Artists Group; New York).”
Myers' earliest oil, Backyard (1887), depicting clotheslines silhouetted against distant tenements, is today thought to be one of the first paintings exemplifying Ashcan School subject matter in America. Similarly around 1893, after sketching a canal boat during a day trip along the Morris and Essex Canal, the artist made his initial sale to the woman who resided on the boat. The price was two dollars.
, John French Sloan
, and Myers, showing their works together for the first time.
Individual responses to Myers' presence, however, were grounded in cultural differences. While the residents of Italian neighborhoods viewed the artist and his activities with excitement and curiosity; those of the Jewish Quarter, whose traditions often forbade the production of representational images, protested by the most pointed of all actions -- moving away from the artist's range of vision.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
artist and writer. Born in Petersburg, Virginia
Petersburg, Virginia
Petersburg is an independent city in Virginia, United States located on the Appomattox River and south of the state capital city of Richmond. The city's population was 32,420 as of 2010, predominantly of African-American ethnicity...
and raised in Philadelphia, Trenton
Trenton, New Jersey
Trenton is the capital of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County. As of the 2010 United States Census, Trenton had a population of 84,913...
and Baltimore, he spent his adult life in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Jerome worked briefly as an actor and scene painter, then studied art at Cooper Union
Cooper Union
The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, commonly referred to simply as Cooper Union, is a privately funded college in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, United States, located at Cooper Square and Astor Place...
and the Art Students League where his main teacher was George de Forest Brush
George de Forest Brush
George de Forest Brush was an American painter. In collaboration with his friend, the artist Abbott H. Thayer, he made contributions to military camouflage, as did his wife, aviator and artist Mary Taylor Brush, and their son, the sculptor Gerome Brush.-Background:Although Brush was born in...
. In 1896 and 1914, he was in Paris, but his main classroom was the streets of New York's lower East Side
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
. His strong interest and feelings for the new immigrants and their life resulted in hundreds of drawings, as well as paintings, etchings and watercolors capturing the whole panorama of their lives as found outside of the crowded tenements which were their first homes in America.
A Story of Two Paintings
In 1934 the Metropolitan Museum of ArtMetropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...
purchased the painting "Street Group," from the Municipal Art Exhibition in Rockefeller Center. The Herald Tribune said in reporting the story that "the painting by Mr. Myers is of a group of women standing talking in a somber street, with children playing about them. Mr. Myers considers it typical of his work, and says it is the sort of scene he most enjoys to paint. 'Old streets and old houses and the people who live in them,' he explained."
"I am trying to catch the New York that is passing," he said. "I painted that down on Delancey Street seven or eight years ago and already the scene has changed in spirit. I want to get it before it is gone."
Twenty two years earlier, in 1912, a major event had taken place in Jerome Myers' life. The occasion was when the Metropolitan Museum of Art first decided to purchase a painting of his titled "The Mission Tent." Here is a quote from the Metropolitan Museum Bulletin in June 1913 talking about their purchase: "Jerome Myers for several years has been showing New Yorkers the artistic possibilities of what is perhaps the unique part of the city's scenes. He has discovered these subjects for himself and treats them in his own way. It is never the exciting moments of street life that move him, only the daily happenings, the usual things that all may see. Boys and girls playing in the square, the crowd at a recreation pier, an organ-grinder followed by a troop of dancing children, old people whom the night freshness lures to the park-bench or the wharf, a religious festival in Little Italy
Little Italy
Little Italy is a general name for an ethnic enclave populated primarily by Italians or people of Italian ancestry, usually in an urban neighborhood.-Canada:*Little Italy, Edmonton, in Alberta*Little Italy, Montreal, in Quebec...
—these are his favorite themes and he renders them with loving sincerity and a profound appreciation of their significance."
Not only was the sale to the Metropolitan a great honor then, but it also provided him with enough money to move his family from their small studio into a studio in the "new" Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
. Over the years, with all the moving around to various studios, he always came back to Carnegie as his real home and in 1940 it was where he passed away with his friends around him. He could not have been in a more perfect place.
Art Digest Magazine - July 1, 1940 - Jerome Myers Passes
“American Art has lost one of it finest, most individual figures with the death on June 19 of Jerome Myers. For more than 50 years Myers, small of stature and bearing a striking resemblance to Paderewski, was a familiar sight on the streets of New York, which he made his special painting province.The lower East Side, with its crowded tenements and struggling immigrants, knew him best and was recorded in hundreds of sketches which were later transcribed onto soft-toned canvases. The poor seems to bring forth Myers’ deepest feelings, but he did not paint them because they and their environment were ugly; he saw the beauty of their humble lives, and on his canvases he has caught that beauty...During those 50 years the cobblestones that Myers used to tramp were smoothed to asphalt pavements, the city’s center of activity crept northward leaving in its wake new, pristine skyscrapers; gas lamps gave way to neon, but the poor remained.
Though Myers later achieved wide honors—he was elected to the Academy and awarded such important prizes as the Altman, the Carnegie and the Isidor Medal—he suffered from neglect in recent years. Forgotten, for the most part, were Myers’ distinctive contributions to our native art and the battles he has fought for art freedom...Last year, as the end neared, Myers looked back on a long and fruitful life and wrote a most interesting autobiography, Artist in Manhattan (American Artists Group; New York).”
Museum & Gallery Collections (Works of Jerome Myers)
- Metropolitan Museum of ArtMetropolitan Museum of ArtThe Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...
, New York, NY - Whitney Museum of American ArtWhitney Museum of American ArtThe Whitney Museum of American Art, often referred to simply as "the Whitney", is an art museum with a focus on 20th- and 21st-century American art. Located at 945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street in New York City, the Whitney's permanent collection contains more than 18,000 works in a wide variety of...
, New York, NY - Smithsonian American Art MuseumSmithsonian American Art MuseumThe Smithsonian American Art Museum is a museum in Washington, D.C. with an extensive collection of American art.Part of the Smithsonian Institution, the museum has a broad variety of American art that covers all regions and art movements found in the United States...
, Washington, DC - Library of CongressLibrary of CongressThe Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
, Washington, DC - The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, PA
- Detroit Institute of ArtsDetroit Institute of ArtsThe Detroit Institute of Arts is a renowned art museum in the city of Detroit. In 2003, the DIA ranked as the second largest municipally owned museum in the United States, with an art collection valued at more than one billion dollars...
, Detroit, MI - Art Institute of ChicagoArt Institute of ChicagoThe School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
, Chicago, IL - Memorial Art GalleryMemorial Art GalleryThe Memorial Art Gallery is the civic art museum of Rochester, New York. Founded in 1913, it is part of the University of Rochester and occupies the southern half of the University's former Prince Street campus...
of the University of Rochester, Rochester, NY - Delaware Art MuseumDelaware Art MuseumThe Delaware Art Museum is an art museum located on the Kentmere Parkway in Wilmington, Delaware, which holds a collection of more than 12,000 works. The museum, was founded in 1912 as the Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts in honor of the artist Howard Pyle and is now celebrating its centennial...
, Wilmington, DE - Corcoran Gallery of ArtCorcoran Gallery of ArtThe Corcoran Gallery of Art is the largest privately supported cultural institution in Washington, DC. The museum's main focus is American art. The permanent collection includes works by Rembrandt, Eugène Delacroix, Edgar Degas, Thomas Gainsborough, John Singer Sargent, Claude Monet, Pablo...
, Washington, DC - Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY
- Cleveland Museum of ArtCleveland Museum of ArtThe Cleveland Museum of Art is an art museum situated in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on Cleveland's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian art, the museum houses a diverse permanent collection of more than 43,000...
, Cleveland, OH - The Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, NH
- The Huntington LibraryThe Huntington LibraryThe Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens is an educational and research institution established by Henry E. Huntington in San Marino, in the San Rafael Hills near Pasadena, California in the United States...
, Art Collections, San Marino, CA - Addison Gallery of American ArtAddison Gallery of American ArtThe Addison Gallery of American Art, as a department of Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, is an academic museum dedicated to collecting American art...
, Andover, MA - National Academy of DesignNational Academy of DesignThe National Academy Museum and School of Fine Arts, founded in New York City as the National Academy of Design – known simply as the "National Academy" – is an honorary association of American artists founded in 1825 by Samuel F. B. Morse, Asher B. Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E...
, New York, NY - Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenHirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenThe Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall, in Washington, D.C., the United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft and is part of the...
, Washington, D.C. - Museum of Fine Arts, BostonMuseum of Fine Arts, BostonThe Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, is one of the largest museums in the United States, attracting over one million visitors a year. It contains over 450,000 works of art, making it one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas...
, MA - St. Bonaventure UniversitySt. Bonaventure UniversitySt. Bonaventure University is a private, Franciscan Catholic university, located in Allegany, Cattaraugus County, New York, United States. It has roughly 2,400 undergraduate and graduate students....
, Quick Center for the Arts, St. Bonaventure, NY - Butler Institute of American ArtButler Institute of American ArtThe Butler Institute of American Art, located on Wick Avenue in Youngstown, Ohio, United States, was the first museum dedicated exclusively to American art. Established by local industrialist and philanthropist Joseph G. Butler, Jr., the museum has been operating pro bono since 1919...
, Youngstown, OH - Westmoreland Museum of American ArtWestmoreland Museum of American ArtThe Westmoreland Museum of American Art is an art museum in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, devoted to American art, with a particular concentration on the art of southwestern Pennsylvania....
, Greensburg, PA - Minneapolis Institute of ArtsMinneapolis Institute of ArtsThe Minneapolis Institute of Arts is a fine art museum located in the Whittier neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, on a campus that covers nearly 8 acres , formerly Morrison Park...
, Minneapolis, MN - Heckscher Museum of ArtHeckscher Museum of ArtThe Heckscher Museum of Art is named after its benefactor, August Heckscher, who in 1920 donated 185 works of art to be housed in a new Beaux-Arts building located in Heckscher Park, in Huntington, New York...
, Huntington, Long Island, NY - Princeton University Art MuseumPrinceton University Art MuseumThe Princeton University Art Museum is Princeton University's gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1882, it now houses over 72,000 works of art that range from antiquity to the contemporary period...
, Princeton, NJ - National Gallery of ArtNational Gallery of ArtThe National Gallery of Art and its Sculpture Garden is a national art museum, located on the National Mall between 3rd and 9th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW, in Washington, DC...
, Landover, MD - Georgia Museum of ArtGeorgia Museum of ArtThe Georgia Museum of Art is an art museum in Athens, Georgia, associated with the University of Georgia.The museum is also, since 1982, the official state museum of art. Located on the East Campus of UGA, in the Performing and Visual Arts Complex, it opened in 1948...
, Athens, GA - San Francisco Museum of Modern ArtSan Francisco Museum of Modern ArtThe San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is a modern art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art and was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th century art...
, San Francisco, CA - Norton Museum of ArtNorton Museum of ArtThe Norton Museum of Art is an art museum located in West Palm Beach, Florida. Its collection includes over 5,000 works, with a concentration in European, American, and Chinese art as well as in contemporary art and photography.-History:...
, West Palm Beach, FL - Portland Art MuseumPortland Art MuseumThe Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon, United States, was founded in 1892, making it the oldest art museum on the West Coast and seventh oldest in the United States. Upon completion of the most recent renovations, the Portland Art Museum became one of the twenty-five largest art museums in...
, , Portland, ME - Denver Art MuseumDenver Art MuseumThe Denver Art Museum is an art museum in Denver, Colorado located in Denver's Civic Center.It is known for its collection of American Indian art,and has a comprehensive collection numbering more than 68,000 works from across the world....
, Denver, CO - Boston UniversityBoston UniversityBoston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
Art Gallery, Boston, MA - Museum of the City of New YorkMuseum of the City of New YorkThe Museum of the City of New York is an art gallery and history museum founded in 1923 to present the history of New York City, USA and its people...
, New York, NY - New York Public LibraryNew York Public LibraryThe New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
, Etching Collections, New York, NY - Staten Island Institute of Arts & Sciences, New York
- The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC
- The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ
- Joslyn Art MuseumJoslyn Art MuseumThe Joslyn Art Museum is the principal fine arts museum in the state of Nebraska, United States of America. Located in Omaha, it is the only museum in the state with a comprehensive permanent collection...
, Omaha, NE - The Jewish MuseumJewish MuseumJewish Museum may refer to:Australia* Jewish Museum of Australia, Melbourne, VictoriaAustria* Jewish Museum ViennaCzech Republic* Jewish Museum of PragueDenmark* Danish Jewish Museum, CopenhagenGeorgia...
, New York, NY - Virginia Museum of Fine ArtsVirginia Museum of Fine ArtsThe Virginia Museum of Fine arts, or VMFA, is an art museum in Richmond, Virginia, in the United States, which opened in 1936.The museum is owned and operated by the Commonwealth of Virginia, while private donations, endowments, and funds are used for the support of specific programs and all...
, Richmond, VA - University of Iowa Museum of ArtUniversity of Iowa Museum of ArtThe University of Iowa Museum of Art is a visual arts institution that is part of the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa, USA.-Introduction:The University of Iowa Museum of Art, established in 1969, has one of the top university art collections in the country...
, Iowa City, IA - High Museum of ArtHigh Museum of ArtThe High Museum of Art , located in Atlanta, is the leading art museum in the Southeastern United States and one of the most-visited art museums in the world. Located on Peachtree Street in Midtown, the city's arts district, the High is a division of the Woodruff Arts Center.-History:The Museum was...
, Atlanta, GA - The Arkansas Arts CenterArkansas Arts CenterOne of the leading cultural institutions in the state, the Arkansas Arts Center is located on the corner of 9th and Commerce streets in MacArthur Park, Little Rock, Arkansas, USA. The Arkansas Arts Center was founded in 1960, but the idea began in 1914, when the Fine Arts Club of Arkansas formed...
, Little Rock, AR - Yale University Art GalleryYale University Art GalleryThe Yale University Art Gallery houses a significant and encyclopedic collection of art in several buildings on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Although it embraces all cultures and periods, the Gallery possesses especially renowned collections of early Italian painting,...
, New Haven, CT - The Montclair Art MuseumMontclair Art MuseumThe Montclair Art Museum is located in Montclair, in Essex County, New Jersey, United States.-Collection:The Montclair Art Museum is one of the few museums in the United States devoted to American art and Native American art forms. The collection consists of more than 12,000 works...
, Montclair, NJ - James A. Michener Art MuseumJames A. Michener Art MuseumThe James A. Michener Art Museum is a private, non-profit museum in Doylestown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania founded in 1988 and named for the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer James A. Michener, a Doylestown resident...
, University of Texas, Austin, TX - Santa Barbara Museum of ArtSanta Barbara Museum of ArtThe Santa Barbara Museum of Art is an art museum located at 1130 State St. in downtown Santa Barbara, California.It was founded in 1941 and currently ranks amongst the top 10 regional art museums in the United States . It is home to both permanent and special collections, the former of which...
, Santa Barbara CA - The New Britain Museum of American ArtNew Britain Museum of American ArtThe New Britain Museum of American Art is an art museum in New Britain, Connecticut. Founded in 1903, it is the first museum in the country dedicated to American art....
, New Britain, CT - Milwaukee Art MuseumMilwaukee Art MuseumThe Milwaukee Art Museum is located on Lake Michigan in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.Beginning around 1872, multiple organizations were founded in order to bring an art gallery to Milwaukee, as the city was still a growing port town with little or no facilities to hold major art exhibitions...
, Milwaukee, WI - Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE
- Museum of Art Fort LauderdaleMuseum of Art Fort LauderdaleThe Museum of Art | Fort Lauderdale is an art museum in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Originating in 1958 as the Fort Lauderdale Art Center, the museum is located in a modernist building designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes. The current building was constructed in 1986, with a wing added in 2001...
, FL - Columbus Museum of ArtColumbus Museum of ArtThe Columbus Museum of Art is an art museum located in downtown Columbus, Ohio. Formed in 1878 as the Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, it was the first art museum to register its charter with the state of Ohio.-Building:...
, Columbus, OH - University of WyomingUniversity of WyomingThe University of Wyoming is a land-grant university located in Laramie, Wyoming, situated on Wyoming's high Laramie Plains, at an elevation of 7,200 feet , between the Laramie and Snowy Range mountains. It is known as UW to people close to the university...
Art Museum, Laramie, WY - Washington County Museum of Fine ArtsWashington County Museum of Fine ArtsWashington County Museum of Fine Arts is an art museum located in Hagerstown, Maryland, United States. The building is located off Park Circle and serves as a centerpiece in Hagerstown City Park. The museum was donated in 1929 by Mr. and Mrs. William Singer, Jr. It was completed in 1931 and two...
, Hagerstown, MD - Herbert F. Johnson Museum of ArtHerbert F. Johnson Museum of ArtThe Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art is an art museum located on the northwest corner of the Arts Quad on the main campus of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. It is most well known for its distinctive concrete facade, its collection which includes two windows from Frank Lloyd Wright's Darwin...
, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY - Mead Art MuseumMead Art MuseumMead Art Museum is an art museum associated with Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts and is a member of Museums10.The Mead Art Museum has a wide ranging collection of over 16,000 items, with a particular strength in American art, including notable works of the Hudson River School and woodcut...
Amherst College, Amherst, MA - Art Gallery of HamiltonArt Gallery of HamiltonArt Gallery of Hamilton, is located in the heart of downtown Hamilton, Ontario on King Street West and is one of Canada’s oldest galleries with a collection of over 9,000 works of art.-History:...
, Ontario, Canada - Wichita Art MuseumWichita Art MuseumThe Wichita Art Museum is an art museum located in Wichita, Kansas. It was established in 1915, when Louise Murdock’s Will created a trust to start a collection of art works by “American painters, potters, sculptors, and textile weavers.” The collection includes works by Mary Cassatt, Arthur G...
, Wichita, KS - Storm King Art CenterStorm King Art CenterThe Storm King Art Center in Mountainville, New York is an open air museum which has extended the concept of a "sculpture garden" to become a "sculpture landscape." Founded in 1960 by Ralph E. Ogden as a museum for Hudson Valley painters, it soon expanded into a major sculpture venue with the...
, Mountainville, NY - Hamilton CollegeHamilton CollegeHamilton College is a private liberal arts college in Clinton, New York, United States. The school was founded in 1793, chartered as Hamilton College in 1812, and has been coeducational since 1978, when it merged with Kirkland College. Hamilton is sometimes referred to as the "College on the Hill,"...
, Emerson Gallery, Clinton, NY - The Columbus Museum, Columbus, GA
- Syracuse UniversitySyracuse UniversitySyracuse University is a private research university located in Syracuse, New York, United States. Its roots can be traced back to Genesee Wesleyan Seminary, founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1832, which also later founded Genesee College...
Art Galleries, Syracuse, NY - Everson Museum of ArtEverson Museum of ArtThe Everson Museum of Art in Downtown Syracuse, New York is a major Central New York museum focusing on American art.-History:The museum was founded in 1897 by art historian George Fisk Comfort ; at that time, it was called the Syracuse Museum of Fine Arts...
, Syracuse, NY - Southern Illinois UniversitySouthern Illinois UniversitySouthern Illinois University is a state university system based in Carbondale, Illinois, in the Southern Illinois region of the state, with multiple campuses...
Museum, Carbondale, IL - Greenville County Museum of ArtGreenville County Museum of ArtThe Greenville County Museum of Art is an art museum located in Greenville, South Carolina. Its collections focus mainly on American art, and its holdings include works by Andrew Wyeth, Josef Albers, Jasper Johns, Andy Warhol, Romare Bearden, Jacob Lawrence, Ronnie Landfield, Eric Fischl, Marylyn...
, Greenville, SC - Museum of Art at Brigham Young University, Provo, UT
- Telfair Museum of ArtTelfair Museum of ArtThe Telfair Museum of Art, located in the historic district of Savannah, Georgia, is the South’s first public art museum. Founded through the bequest of Mary Telfair , a prominent local citizen, the museum opened in 1886 in the Telfair family’s renovated Regency-style mansion, known as the Telfair...
, Savannah, GA - Arkell Museum, Canajoharie, NY
- Hillstrom Museum of Art, Saint Peter, MN
- Muskegon Museum of Art, Muskegon, MI
- Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute, Utica, NY
Gallery of New York City images by Jerome Myers
Three segments from the essay "John Sloan and Jerome Myers: 'Pioneers of the Ashcan School'" by Bennard B. Perlman (2010 Exhibition Catalog "Ashcan Humanists: John Sloan & Jerome Myers" - The Hope Horn Gallery, The University of Scranton - 2/5/2010 to 3/12/2010)
The Early Years
Born in Petersburg, Virginia, Jerome Myers was one of Abram and Julia Hillman Myers' five children. As their father was often absent, the Myers clan was raised by their mother and eventually lived in Trenton, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From time to time, the siblings were placed in foster homes when Mrs. Myers became ill. Given these family hardships, Myers began taking odd jobs at a young age, living in Baltimore, Maryland, before moving on to New York City. Arriving in Manhattan in 1886 at the age of nineteen, Myers worked for several years as a scene painter and later for the Moss Engraving Company, where he reproduced photographic negatives. During this time he began attending evening art classes at Cooper Union and the Art Students League. Even at this date, the artist's interest in urban subjects was evident.Myers' earliest oil, Backyard (1887), depicting clotheslines silhouetted against distant tenements, is today thought to be one of the first paintings exemplifying Ashcan School subject matter in America. Similarly around 1893, after sketching a canal boat during a day trip along the Morris and Essex Canal, the artist made his initial sale to the woman who resided on the boat. The price was two dollars.
Becoming a Professional Artist
In 1895, Myers found work in the art department of the New York Tribune. With savings of two hundred and fifty dollars from this job, he traveled to Paris in 1896. Upon his return to New York City, with only twenty dollars left, he rented, for seven dollars a month, a studio at 232 West 14th Street in a former five-story mansion, "equipped with a skylight and converted to the use of artists." There, his next door neighbor turned out to be Edward Adam Kramer, a painter just one year older than Myers himself. While the latter's art training had been limited to short stints at New York's Cooper Union and the Art Students League, Kramer had acquired his education in the European art centers of Munich, Berlin, and Paris. It was Kramer who ushered Myers into the world of the professional artist. One day; when the art dealer William Macbeth arrived at Kramer's studio to view work, Kramer directed him to Myers' studio as well. Macbeth purchased two small paintings of his early New York street scenes from Myers on the spot, and simultaneously recommended that the newcomer bring additional work to the gallery. Macbeth thought highly of these two paintings and, taking them to his gallery, soon sold one to an appreciative banker, James Speyer. As an early critic for the New York Globe stated: "Myers' reputation dates from that purchase." Macbeth also suggested that Myers relinquish further drawing in pencil and pastel, and turn instead to oils. In the years following 1902, Myers sold work through the Macbeth Gallery and exhibited in group shows at other venues. Significantly, in March and April 1903, when the Colonial Club of New York held its annual art show Exhibition of Paintings Mainly by New Men, among the twenty artists included were Robert HenriRobert Henri
Robert Henri was an American painter and teacher. He was a leading figure of the Ashcan School in art.- Early life :...
, John French Sloan
John French Sloan
John French Sloan was an American artist. As a member of The Eight, he became a leading figure in the Ashcan School of realist artists. He was known for his urban genre painting and ability to capture the essence of neighborhood life in New York City, often through his window...
, and Myers, showing their works together for the first time.
Summer In Manhattan
For Jerome Myers, summer in Manhattan was rich in opportunity, for when the mercury soared it was certain to bring tenement dwellers out into the streets and parks of the city. By July 1906, Myers' reputation as a skilled artist depicting the life of the people on the Lower East Side was such that a New York Times reporter was assigned to him beginning at five o'clock one morning, in order to observe the artist capturing likenesses of industrious adults at work and lively children at play. To walk through the East Side with Myers, the reporter noted, "turning off here and there to glance at some particular house or group of people,... [was] to receive an impression of a joyous life lived in the open air for much the same reason as people live in that fashion in Europe -- because their homes are not as comfortable as the streets.Individual responses to Myers' presence, however, were grounded in cultural differences. While the residents of Italian neighborhoods viewed the artist and his activities with excitement and curiosity; those of the Jewish Quarter, whose traditions often forbade the production of representational images, protested by the most pointed of all actions -- moving away from the artist's range of vision.
Quotations from Newspaper Reviews and Articles
- One may know the great east side fairly well, and yet it is a revelation to walk through it with so close a student of its life and its people as Mr. Myers has become. - NY Times – 6-1-1906 – (Life on the East Side His Art Inspiration)
- Let us recognize that the work of Sloan and a few others, such as Robert Henri, C.W. Hawthorne, William G. Glackens, Jerome Myers, and George Luks, is a natural and wholesome reaction from the vogue of frippery, tameness, and sentimentality. - 1907 (Story of American Painting in America) – Charles Henry Caffin
- The broad, free handling is that of a painter of more than technical powers. Mr. Myers must be reckoned among the mean of today and of many tomorrows in American Art. – Unidentified newspaper 1908
- Twenty-five canvases by Jerome Myers, were placed on exhibition yesterday in the Macbeth Galleries. Those who know their New York well will appreciate these graphic and truthful representations. – New York Herald – 1-5-1908 (Myers one-man show at Macbeth)
- The poor we have always with us, but not always in the guise presented in the paintings by Jerome Myers, now being shown at the Macbeth Gallery, 450 Fifth Avenue. These are records of life on the east side and in out-of-the-way corners of the town that but few of us are familiar with. – NY Times 1-7-1908 (Myers one-man show at Macbeth)
- Nearly all of the examples picture existence by day and by night as the East Side dweller sees it and feels it. With these people Mr. Myers has sympathy: hence, nearly all of his work lacks prettiness. Possibly not one would be considered favorably by an Academy committee, and yet in many of them there is not only a record, but fine art, with color, with tone, and with atmospheric effect that remind you of the minor works by old Italian painters. – Brooklyn Daily Eagle – 1-1-1908
- Mr. Myers has above most of his contemporaries a keen appreciation of the drama of the city, and with his feeling for color at once chastened and heightened, his canvases would take their place in the front ranks of contemporary art. – NY Times – 12-1-1908
- His work is a valuable record of a side of life in this city which cannot but change completely in another score of years, and, moreover, it is art and art of a high character. – NY Times – 5-2-1909
- One need merely pass through Mulberry Street to know that childlike gaiety and even grace exist there and in other tenement quarters of the city. Mr. Myers has the happy turn of mind to see the dingy truth in all its dinginess and yet preserve the loveliness of color and tone that blooms never more flowerlike than among the picturesque byways swarming with the children of transplanted races. – NY Times – 5-9-1909
- Jerome Myers, who is represented by two admirable pictures, is so fully recognized as a master of his technique that one takes from him without comment work which is in an extremely high rank of expressive draughtsmanship. … At all events, this little picture of New York life (Night), tingling with character and actuality, yet conveying a sense of the monumental by the nobility of the composition and the large modeling of the forms, should it find its way into one of the great collections of the future, may be trusted to hold its own as representative of an extremely important phase of twentieth century painting. – NY Times – 10-31-1909
- With the three street subjects by Jerome Myers we swing into the composite life of the city and get the harsh and stirring note to which the great unconscious army of our new civilization marches. Apparently we are not to be a somber race, since above the misery of the east side rises the love of strong color and play. No one has done more than Mr. Myers to make us realize what the open spaces and organized pleasures of the city mean to the people at large, which is a matter apart from his art, but has the connection with it to be claimed for every subject to which appropriate artistic expression has been given. – NY Times – 1-15-1911
- Myers has a skill, but he has more than skill, he has sympathy that is boundless and a clairvoyant humor that is the highest truth. – The Evening Mail, NY – 4-4-1911
- But no one has recorded its accidents and incidents with so large and optimistic a sympathy; no one has shown its strange blossoms of exotic beauty with such natural and unpremeditated appreciation; no one has recorded its somber moments with such respect for their solemnity. His imagination acting upon his essentially vivid materials accentuates its vitality, so that in looking at his drawing we feel this little stage to be the real world and all the rest unreal. As a technician his most noteworthy success is in his use of line, and in America he has few rivals in this respect; but his reading of humanity raises him above the rank of mere technician to that of artist and poet. He does not simply illustrate, he illuminates his subject. – NY Times – 4-9-1911 (Madison Art Galleries Exhibition)
- As for Mr. Jerome Myers' paintings, each one in turn gave a sense of fresh apprehension of the extraordinary art of this man of simple quiet canvases. How well he understands city life, how beautifully he makes you see the joy in the hearts of his ragged little children, as well as the grief in the souls of the somber aged, was shown in his six paintings which really form a record of his insight into the realities of life and the beauties that are hidden deep in some seeming sad realities. – The Craftsman – January 1912 (MacDowell Club Exhibition)
- Jerome Myers for several years has been showing New Yorkers the artistic possibilities of what is perhaps the unique part of the city's scenes. He has discovered these subjects for himself and treats them in his own way. It is never the exciting moments of street life that move him, only the daily happenings, the usual things that all may see. Boys and girls playing in the square, the crowd at a recreation pier, an organ-grinder followed by a troop of dancing children, old people whom the night freshness lures to the park-bench or the wharf, a religious festival in Little Italy—these are his favorite themes and he renders them with loving sincerity and a profound appreciation of their significance. – Metropolitan Museum Bulletin – 6-5-1912 (on museum purchase of The Night Mission)
- There are other engaging pictures. In Pursuit of Pleasure, by Jerome Myers, a group of children following a hurdy gurdy, reminds one of the harmony between the picture by Mr. Myers and that by Whistler hung side by side at the Metropolitan Museum. – New York Times – May 31, 1914 (Summer exhibition at Macbeth Galleries)
- For the artist, for the humanitarian, for the lover of all truth about human nature these etchings of Jerome Myers are sure to bring a keener interest in and enlarged vision of beauty, a greater appreciation of the etching's line as a means of unfolding human life for us, and a finer understanding of humanity in its franker, simpler expression. – The Craftsman - October 1915 (Jerome Myers as an Etcher and Student of Human Nature - Gustav Stickley, Editor)
- But Myers does insist that whatever truth is presented by a realist shall be nothing but the truth. I remember his annoyance upon observing in a picture of the East Side a wash line suspended across the street. He had lived and worked in that district for thirty years and never had he seen such a thing. Yes, he has lived in the lower East Side for so long a time that it is home to him. He draws and etches and paints the life of the people there with such rare sympathy and insight because he has made himself one of them. ...But Myers has not always that smiling twinkle in his eye. There are moods of intense sadness in the man. So well does he know the human body (one would say with a physician's as well as with an artist's knowledge) that his sympathy is expressed in poignant lines. We know how the little boy feels as he swings high up over one of those dusty, dreary, necessary playgrounds, and we share the backache of the old man on the park bench, the pitiful comfort of the hard-seat after his painful walk. ' – Jerome Myers by Duncan Phillips – 1917 (Magazine of art, Volume 8 Page 481, American Federation of Arts)
Jerome Myers' Quotations from his Autobiography Artist In Manhattan (1940)
- The song of my work is a simple song of the poor, far from the annals of the rich.
- At Cooper Union, where I first began to study art, and later at the Art Students League, where I continued to attend classes over a period of some ten years, the art taught during my time was either the academic French of the day or the academic painting of the Munich school... I questioned the wisdom of this procedure.
- Directly, I ventured out to interpret life for myself, to render the impression of the city and the people that I really cared for. ... In this instinctive way, I set myself in opposition to the authority that had governed my art instruction. It was a choice between becoming merely a cultured artist or learning to make a personal statement of my own feeling.
- [With] a solitary crayon pencil, ...[I peered] at the crowded East Side of New York City, making notes of the historical poor, of the poverty that struggles on...At nightfall, the surcease of a great city, the repose in the parks, or on the recreation piers, the aged gossip, the children at their endless play — a panorama which was for me unceasing in its interest, thrilling in its significance...
- My love was my witness in recording these earnest, simple lives, these visions of slums clothed in dignity, never to me mere slums but the habitations of a people who were rich in spirit and effort.
- To this teeming metropolis of the poor whom I studied, to them I came in quiet friendship. To them I owe much.
- [J]ust as [Rembrandt] went to live in the Dutch ghetto, so I too went to study in the ghetto — that of our own East Side.
External links
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