ANNA LEE STACEY

(American, 1871-1943)

APPLE BLOSSOMS

Oil on Canvas

33½ x 35½ Inches

Signed Lower Right, 'Anna Less Stacey'

Additionally Signed, Verso, and Dated 1924

 

An elegant and substantial still-life depicting apple blossoms elegantly and informally arranged before a Japanese Ukiyo-e (Floating World) print in the style of Utagawa Kuniyoshi. A large and important oil by this well-listed American woman artist who studied with Chase in New York and with Laurens in Paris.

Framed dimensions: 41 H x 2 D x 43 W inches

 

Anna Lee Stacey began her artistic education at the Art Students League in New York City, where she studied under the American Impressionist William Merritt Chase. His emphasis on direct observation and bold brushwork was profoundly influential on her early development. She continued her training at the ASL with the portraitist Irving R. Wiles who helped her develop her talent for the psychological penetration of her subjects and who also led her to explore greater complexities of color harmony. Stacey subsequently traveled to Paris to study at the Académie Julian. Here, she worked under the French master Jean-Paul Laurens, who became her guide in the rigorous drawing techniques and classical compositional methods of the French academic tradition.

 

Stacey earned early critical success and public recognition through competitive scholarships and prizes, receiving both the prestigious Dodge Prize from the National Academy of Design and the Julia A. Shaw Memorial Prize from New York's Art Students League.

 

From 1895, Stacey exhibited regularly at the National Academy of Design's annual exhibitions in New York. In 1906, she was elected to Associate membership of the NAD and, one year later, to full membership- a rare accomplishment for a woman of that time.

She also exhibited frequently and with success at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, one of America's most important showcasing venues and participated in exhibitions at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and at the Art Institute of Chicago (1895-1933). Additionally, she was a lifetime member of the National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors and an invited exhibitor at the Pan-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915, an accomplishment that earned her broad national recognition.

 

Anna Lee Stacey's work is held in prestigious public and private collections nationwide including in the permanent collections of the National Academy of Design and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art among others. She is listed in all relevant art reference works including 'Who Was Who in American Art' and 'Artists in California (1786-1940)'.

 

Reference:

Who Was Who in American Art 1564-1975: 400 Years of Artists in America, Peter Hastings Falk, Sound View Press 1999, Vol. III, p.3134; Artists in California 1786-1940, Third Edition, Edan Milton Hughes: Crocker Art Museum, Sheridan Books 2002, Vol. II, p.1051; Women Artists in America: Eighteenth Century to the Present, Jim Collins, Second Printing, 1973; Emerging from the Shadows: A Survey of Women Artists Working in California, 1860-1960, Maurine St. Gaudens, Schiffer Publishing Ltd 2015, Vol. 4, page 1048-1051; et al.

 

EXHIBITIONS:

Annual Exhibition of Oil Paintings & Sculpture by American Artists, AIC, 1895, 97

Annual Exhibition of Works by Chicago and Vicinity Artists, AIC, 1897-1933

Annual Exhibition, Palette Club, AIC, 1895

Annual Exhibition of Oil Paintings & Sculpture by American Artists, AIC, 1901

St Louis/Louisiana Purchase Exposition, 1904

Corcoran Gallery, Washington DC

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia

Solo, Chicago Galleries Association, 1927

Chicago Society of Artists Exhibition, 1912

Paintings by Anna L Stacey, AIC, 1905, 14

Paintings by 8 artists, including John H and Anna Lee Stacey, AIC, 1921

Panama-Pacific Exposition, San Francisco (CA), 1915

 

AWARDS:

Prize, West End Woman's Club Salon, 1896

Fortnightly Prize, AIC, 1902

Martin Cahn Prize, AIC, 1902

Marshall Field Prize, 1907

Prize, Chicago Society of Artists Exhibition, 1912

Logan Medal, Annual Exhibition of Works by Chicago Artists, 1921

Knapp Memorial Prize, Annual Exhibition of Works by Chicago Artists, AIC, 1922

Clyde M Carr prize, Annual Exhibition of Works by Chicago and Vicinity Artists, AIC, 1938

 

MEMBERSHIPS:

Palette Club, Chicago

Chicago Water Color Club

Artist Guild of Chicago

Collections:

Chicago Women's Club

Kenwood College, Chicago

Union League Club of Chicago

Arche Club, Chicago

Bridges Collection, Chicago

Brauer Museum of Art, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, IN

Christine Schwartz Collection, Chicago