Additional information
| Artist | Merritt |
|---|---|
| Country | American |
| Region | North American |
ArtistMerritt, Anna Lea
Artist Years1844-1930
Artist NationalityAmerican
TitleEve
Year1887
MediumPrint > Etching
DimensionsPlate: 13.1 X 18.9 inches
Sheet: 18 X 24 inches
Description
Etching, signed boldly in pencil at lower left, printed in bistre ink on smooth Japan vellum. Collection National Museum of Women in the Arts.
NotesAnna Massey Lea was born in 1844 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of an affluent Quaker couple, Joseph Lea and Susanna Massey, and the eldest of six sisters. She studied anatomy at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. In 1865, the family moved to Europe, where she took art lessons from Stefano Ussi, Heinrich Hoffman, Léon Cogniet and Alphonse Legros. They moved to London in 1870 to escape the Franco-Prussian War, and in 1871 she met Henry Merritt (1822–1877), a noted art critic and picture conservator, who would become her tutor and later, her husband. They married 17 April 1877 but he died 10 July the same year. She had no children and did not marry again. Merritt spent the rest of her life in England, though with frequent trips to the USA, with exhibitions and awards in both countries, becoming a celebrated artist. She exhibited her work at the Palace of Fine Arts and The Woman's Building at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois. In 1894–95 she painted the walls of St Martin's Church, Blackheath village, using a new technique of painting on dry plaster using silicone-based paints to counter the effects of damp. The paintings are of scenes from the life of Christ. She died on 5 April 1930, in Hurstbourne Tarrant, Hampshire.
(source: wikipedia.org)