N. C. Wyeth

American painter, illustrator, 1882–1945

BiographyNewell Convers Wyeth (1882-1945) was born in Needham, MA. In 1899 he graduated from the Mechanic Arts School in Boston, where he studied drafting. After courses at the Massachusetts Normal Art School, Wyeth enrolled in the Eric Pape School of Art in Boston. He spent the summer of 1901 studying with George L. Noyes in Annisquam, MA, where he met his future fellow Howard Pyle pupils Clifford Ashley, Sidney Chase, and Henry Peck. In 1902, Wyeth moved to Wilmington to train with Howard Pyle. Four months later, Wyeth sold his first illustration: a painting of a bronco buster which appeared on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post for February 21, 1903.

Wyeth spent the summer of 1903 at Pyle's Chadds Ford summer school. After a trip to Colorado and New Mexico in the fall of 1904, he painted a number of Western subjects for the Post, Scribner's, and Harper's Monthly Magazine. In 1908, Wyeth now married to his wife Carolyn, settled permanently in Chadds Ford.

Wyeth's reputation as a prolific illustrator of books and magazines was established. He went on to illustrate classic fiction, including Treasure Island, Robin Hood, and Robinson Crusoe.He also painted murlas, including a series at the Hotel Traymore in Atlantic City in 1915 and The Apotheosis of the Family for the Wilmington (DE) Savings Fund in 1932. Later in his career, he turned increasingly to landscape and genre painting, frustrated with the commercialism of illustration and advertising art.

Wyeth encouraged his children in their artistic talents. Andrew, Carolyn, and Henriette became painters, and Ann studied music. Nathaniel became an engineer. Peter Hurd and John McCoy (both sons-in-law) studied with Wyeth, who died in 1945 in Chadds Ford.

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