Williams & Everett
Encyclopedia
Williams & Everett in Boston
, Massachusetts
, was an art dealership run by Henry Dudley Williams and William Everett. The firm sold original artworks by American and European artists, as well as "photographs and carbon-pictures of eminent persons, noted places, and famous paintings." It also continued the mirror and picture frame business that had been established earlier by the Doggett brothers.
Williams and his new business partner, William Everett, were related by marriage; Williams had married Everett's sister Isabel in 1832. Before creating a formal partnership, Williams and Everett each sold mirrors, picture frames and carpets from the same address on Washington Street.
The gallery was located at the corner of Bedford and Washington Street until 1885. The gallery moved in 1885 from downtown to Back Bay, where it remained until the business closed around 1907. "Williams & Everett's Galleries, at No. 79 Boylston Street, were ... designed and built expressly as a repository of the Fine Arts. ... The architectural adornment of the interior is of the English Renaissance, with carved wood and heavy beams in sight. On one side is a carved chimney piece, extending to the ceiling, and near this is a grand staircase leading to a series of galleries, extending from the carved wood coigne which looks down into the store, to the balcony overlooking Park Square
. The wainscoting of dark wood is surmounted with pomegranate hangings, and the ceiling is effectively decorated in plain and harmonious tints. Incandescent lights placed in the ceiling in a novel and original manner, are used throughout the store and galleries."
European artists exhibited included Rosa Bonheur
and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
. Williams & Everett also exhibited and sold works by American artists such as:
"In the store are departments for etchings, engravings, water colors and photographs. If you desire to purchase a fine impression, a rare proof, a unique etching, a carbon reproduction of a favorite picture by one of the old masters, or a representative work of the modern schools, if you want instructive photographs of ancient sculptures or classic ruins, you are sure to find them in the ample folios of this establishment." The firm published its own pictorial reproductions of selected artworks, such as a chromolithograph of the character "Dotty Dimple" (after Elizabeth Murray), and photographic portraits of H.W. Longfellow
and his family.
Clients included Thomas Thompson. Among the many walk-in visitors to the gallery was Sophia Peabody Hawthorne in 1863: "5 June, Thursday. Finest day - cool. We went out after breakfast with Annie. We visited Studio gallery. ... Then to Williams & Everett's - Then we shopped." "29 September, Monday. I went to town at noon. Went to see Tilton's pictures at Williams & Everetts."
The firm consisted of its founders, Henry Dudley Williams (1809-1888) his brother-in-law William Everett (1821-1899), and their sons, Henry Dudley Williams (1833-1907) and William B. Everett (1856-1907)
In 1901, "Williams & Everett ... made an assignment. The liabilities are said to be between $40,000 and $50,000, and the assets consist principally if a large stock of prints, engravings and paintings of high quality. The firm, since the death of Mr. Everett several years ago, has consisted of Henry D. Williams. It is the hope of the firm and assignee that the affairs can be arranged without interruption of business and in such a manner as to re-establish the business on a firm foundation." The firm seems to have ceased with the death of H.D. Williams in 1907.
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
, was an art dealership run by Henry Dudley Williams and William Everett. The firm sold original artworks by American and European artists, as well as "photographs and carbon-pictures of eminent persons, noted places, and famous paintings." It also continued the mirror and picture frame business that had been established earlier by the Doggett brothers.
History
Gallery founder Dudley Williams had worked for John Doggett & Co., 1816-1855. "John Doggett retired from the firm in 1845, and his brother Samuel in 1854, and the business was reorganized, the manufacture of mirror and picture frames being continued under the name of Williams & Everett, who added the branch of paintings, etc.."Williams and his new business partner, William Everett, were related by marriage; Williams had married Everett's sister Isabel in 1832. Before creating a formal partnership, Williams and Everett each sold mirrors, picture frames and carpets from the same address on Washington Street.
The gallery was located at the corner of Bedford and Washington Street until 1885. The gallery moved in 1885 from downtown to Back Bay, where it remained until the business closed around 1907. "Williams & Everett's Galleries, at No. 79 Boylston Street, were ... designed and built expressly as a repository of the Fine Arts. ... The architectural adornment of the interior is of the English Renaissance, with carved wood and heavy beams in sight. On one side is a carved chimney piece, extending to the ceiling, and near this is a grand staircase leading to a series of galleries, extending from the carved wood coigne which looks down into the store, to the balcony overlooking Park Square
Park Square (Boston)
Park Square in downtown Boston, Massachusetts is bounded by Stuart, Charles, Boylston, and Arlington Streets. It is the home of the Boston Four Seasons Hotel and the Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers. Across Boylston Street is the Boston Public Garden...
. The wainscoting of dark wood is surmounted with pomegranate hangings, and the ceiling is effectively decorated in plain and harmonious tints. Incandescent lights placed in the ceiling in a novel and original manner, are used throughout the store and galleries."
European artists exhibited included Rosa Bonheur
Rosa Bonheur
Rosa Bonheur, born Marie-Rosalie Bonheur, was a French animalière, realist artist, and sculptor. As a painter she became famous primarily for two chief works: Ploughing in the Nivernais , which was first exhibited at the Salon of 1848, and is now in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris depicts a team...
and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot was a French landscape painter and printmaker in etching. Corot was the leading painter of the Barbizon school of France in the mid-nineteenth century...
. Williams & Everett also exhibited and sold works by American artists such as:
- Henry BaconHenry Bacon (painter)Henry Bacon was an American painter and author.Henry A. Bacon was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts in 1839. During the American Civil War, he enlisted in the Union Army on 16 July 1861 and acted as a field artist for Frank Leslie's Weekly while he served as a soldier within the 13th Massachusetts...
- Albert BierstadtAlbert BierstadtAlbert Bierstadt was a German-American painter best known for his lavish, sweeping landscapes of the American West. In obtaining the subject matter for these works, Bierstadt joined several journeys of the Westward Expansion...
- BricherAlfred Thompson BricherAlfred Thompson Bricher was a painter associated with White Mountain art and the Hudson River School.-Life and work:...
- George L. Brown
- Mary CassattMary CassattMary Stevenson Cassatt was an American painter and printmaker. She lived much of her adult life in France, where she first befriended Edgar Degas and later exhibited among the Impressionists...
- Frederic Edwin ChurchFrederic Edwin ChurchFrederic Edwin Church was an American landscape painter born in Hartford, Connecticut. He was a central figure in the Hudson River School of American landscape painters...
- George Curtis
- Sophia Towne Darrah
- H. Anthony Dyer
- George Fuller
- Régis François GignouxRégis François GignouxRégis François Gignoux was a French painter who was active in the United States from 1840 to 1870. He was born in Lyon, France and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts under the French historical painter Hippolyte Delaroche, who inspired Gignoux to turn his talents toward landscape painting...
- Childe HassamChilde HassamFrederick Childe Hassam was a prolific American Impressionist painter, noted for his urban and coastal scenes. Along with Mary Cassatt and John Henry Twachtman, Hassam was instrumental in promulgating Impressionism to American collectors, dealers, and museums...
- Thomas H. Hinckley
- George HitchcockGeorge HitchcockGeorge Hitchcock was an American artist, born in Providence, Rhode Island.Hitchcock graduated from the University of Manitoba, and from Harvard Law School in 1874...
- George InnessGeorge InnessGeorge Inness was an American landscape painter; born in Newburgh, New York; died at Bridge of Allan in Scotland. His work was influenced, in turn, by that of the old masters, the Hudson River school, the Barbizon school, and, finally, by the theology of Emanuel Swedenborg, whose spiritualism...
- Ernest LongfellowErnest Wadsworth LongfellowErnest Wadsworth Longfellow was an artist in Boston, Massachusetts, and New York. He was the son of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.-Biography:Ernest Longfellow was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and raised at Craigie House...
- John Low
- A.S. Patterson
- Sarah S. Perkins
- John E.C. Peterson
- William Henry PowellWilliam Henry PowellWilliam Henry Powell , was an American artist from Ohio.Powell is known for a painting of the Battle of Lake Erie, of which one copy hangs in the Ohio state capitol building and the other, in the United States Capitol. Powell has a second piece of artwork displayed in the United States Capitol...
- W.T. Richards
- Caroline Hunt Rimmer
- Theodore RobinsonTheodore RobinsonTheodore Robinson was an American painter best known for his impressionist landscapes. He was one of the first American artists to take up impressionism in the late 1880s, visiting Giverny and developing a close friendship with Claude Monet...
- John RogersJohn Rogers (sculptor)John Rogers was an American sculptor who produced very popular, relatively inexpensive figurines in the latter 19th century.He became famous for his small genre sculptures, popularly termed "Rogers Groups", which were mass produced in cast plaster...
- Henry SandhamHenry SandhamHenry "Hy" Sandham was a Canadian painter and illustrator. He was the brother of author and numismatist Alfred Sandham.- Biography :...
- William Sartain
- Frank Hill SmithFrank Hill SmithFrank Hill Smith was an artist and interior designer in Boston, Massachusetts, United States in the 19th-century. He painted landscapes and figures; and designed wall frescos, stage curtains, stained glass windows, and other decor...
- TaitArthur Fitzwilliam TaitArthur Fitzwilliam Tait was an American artist who is known mostly for his paintings of wildlife. During most of his career, he was associated with the New York City art scene.-Biography:...
- Robert W. Van Boskerck
- Elihu VedderElihu VedderElihu Vedder was an American symbolist painter, book illustrator, and poet, born in New York City....
- Theodore Wendel
- Moses WightMoses WightMoses Wight was an artist in Boston, Massachusetts and Paris in the 19th-century. He painted portraits of Edward Everett, Louis Agassiz, Charles Sumner, Alexander von Humboldt, and other notables.-Biography:...
"In the store are departments for etchings, engravings, water colors and photographs. If you desire to purchase a fine impression, a rare proof, a unique etching, a carbon reproduction of a favorite picture by one of the old masters, or a representative work of the modern schools, if you want instructive photographs of ancient sculptures or classic ruins, you are sure to find them in the ample folios of this establishment." The firm published its own pictorial reproductions of selected artworks, such as a chromolithograph of the character "Dotty Dimple" (after Elizabeth Murray), and photographic portraits of H.W. Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline...
and his family.
"Williams & Everett, recognizing the deficiency in the subjects of photographs brought to America, have made this particular branch a specialty. ... One portion of their establishment is entirely devoted to this class of art, and here on the walls are hung large and magnificent carbons of the rarest subjects. Below these pictures of Michael Angelo, frescoes from the Sistine Chapel, his sculptures from the church of San Lorenzo, and the old frescoes of Fra Angelico and Giotto in the convent of San Marco at Florence, are ranged in large wooden cases separately the works of the famous artists, some thousand in number. Here is a whole section devoted to Bellini, another to Cimabue, and another to Velasquez. Their pictures from Spain, Italy, and Germany, France and England, are collected here, and, sitting at the table at which visitors are freely allowed to examine these treasures, a feeling of embarras de richesse comes over one."
Clients included Thomas Thompson. Among the many walk-in visitors to the gallery was Sophia Peabody Hawthorne in 1863: "5 June, Thursday. Finest day - cool. We went out after breakfast with Annie. We visited Studio gallery. ... Then to Williams & Everett's - Then we shopped." "29 September, Monday. I went to town at noon. Went to see Tilton's pictures at Williams & Everetts."
The firm consisted of its founders, Henry Dudley Williams (1809-1888) his brother-in-law William Everett (1821-1899), and their sons, Henry Dudley Williams (1833-1907) and William B. Everett (1856-1907)
In 1901, "Williams & Everett ... made an assignment. The liabilities are said to be between $40,000 and $50,000, and the assets consist principally if a large stock of prints, engravings and paintings of high quality. The firm, since the death of Mr. Everett several years ago, has consisted of Henry D. Williams. It is the hope of the firm and assignee that the affairs can be arranged without interruption of business and in such a manner as to re-establish the business on a firm foundation." The firm seems to have ceased with the death of H.D. Williams in 1907.
Further reading
- Copley's picture of King Charles the First demanding in the House of Commons the five impeached members, A.D. MDCXLI-II: now exhibiting at the rooms of Williams and Everett, 254 Washington Street, Boston, for the benefit of the city public library. Boston: W. White, printer, 1859. Google books
- Catalogue of oil paintings and water colors by the late J. Rollin Tilton ... of Rome: on exhibition and sale from January 23 to February 2, 1889, in Williams & Everett's gallery. Google books
- King's hand-book of Boston. Boston: M. King, 1889; p.350+. Google books
External links
- Library of Congress. "On exhibition at Williams & Everett's, No. 234 Washington Street, Boston, the original painting of Florinde, by Winterhalter, (exhibited in the Royal Academy of arts, 1852.) Admission 25 cents."
- Indiana State Museum. "Engraving of a beardless Abraham LincolnAbraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
. ... A ring of dried flowers and plants encircles the portrait. .... The label reads: '486. From Williams & Everett, (Successors to John Doggett & Co. and N.D. Cotton) ... Boston.'"