Frederick Styles Agate

Background

Frederick Styles Agate was born on January 29, 1803 at Sparta, New York, United States, the son of Thomas and Hannah Agate; they were born in Shipley, England and settled in Sparta, New York, United States.

Education

As a boy he made notable drawings of animals and at the age of fifteen he was sent to New York to study with John Rubens Smith, an English mezzotinter, who, settling in America, had become a popular teacher of drawing and painting. Agate at once showed himself a careful and correct draughtsman.

In 1825 he and his fellow student Thomas S. Cummings, afterwards treasurer of the National Academy and its historian, left Smith to paint in oil and copy from the antique under S. F. B. Morse at the Academy of Fine Arts.

Finding at this academy "no liberal and accommodating spirit, " they organized a cooperative class to meet at the members' rooms.

The New York Historical Society soon extended to them the use of a room, and thus was the National Academy of Design "initiated and managed exclusively by the artists. "

Career

In 1827 Agate set up at 152 Broadway as historical and portrait painter. He had already shown two pictures at the National Academy's first exhibition, May 1826. Thereafter, down to his death, he was a regular exhibitor, in 1829 contributing fifteen paintings, and in several other years ten or more. His "Ugolino" and the "Old Oaken Bucket" of 1834 were especially popular. His success with them encouraged Agate to go abroad.

In 1834 he went to Paris and thence to Florence, where he made copies for his friend and patron James Boorman. He started a large canvas "Jesuit Missionaries among the Indians" on which he was working at Rome when seized with a severe and nearly mortal illness. His health continuing poor, he sailed from Leghorn to New York in 1835.

Despite advancing tuberculosis, Agate continued to paint and send pictures to the National Academy exhibitions.

In the winter of 1843-1844 several New York artists met frequently to criticize each other's compositions. While attending one of these meetings on a stormy evening, Agate was fatally stricken, and was sent to his parents' home at Sparta, where "he lingered until about the beginning of May. "

Agate's works belonged to a period in which the mission of art was generally held to be moralistic as well as esthetic, and he himself, a profoundly religious man, was "of opinion that mind should have precedence of mere skill and manner; that simple imitations of what is called nature, without aiming at that which awakens a responsive feeling in the heart, ought to be viewed in no other light than as a curious display of human dexterity. " But his own compositions, earnestly fashioned in the light of this conception, have not stood the test of time. They are now regarded as of antiquarian rather than artistic interest.

Achievements

• Agate together with Cummings led the movement which resulted in the formation of the National Academy of Design.

Religion

Agate was a profoundly religious man.

Connections

There is no record of his family.

Father:

Thomas Agate

Mother:

Hannah Agate

Brother:

Alfred T. Agate

Friend:

Thomas S. Cummings

References

• Book of the Artists: American Artist Life Comprising Biographical and Critical Sketches of American Artisits