Halsey Cooley Ives

Background

Halsey Cooley was born on October 27, 1847 in Montour Falls, New York, United States, son of Hiram DuBoise and Teresa (McDowell) Ives. His father died about the beginning of the Civil War and the son took up the work of a draftsman.

Education

After study abroad, Ives entered the faculty of Washington University.

Career

In 1864 Ives entered the government service in that capacity and was sent to Nashville, Tennessee, where his association with artists and especially with Alexander Piatowski, a Pole, developed his enthusiasm and ability. From 1869 to 1874 he traveled in the South and West, and in Mexico, as a designer and decorator, and in the latter year he went to St. Louis as instructor in the Polytechnic School.

He had begun in 1874 a free evening class in drawing, which grew finally in 1879 into the St. Louis Museum and School of Fine Arts, afterward developed as a department of the University under his direction. Its first museum building at Nineteenth and Locust Streets (now demolished) was opened in 1881, and Ives was active in building up its collections and also in popularizing art by means of Sunday lectures to artisans.

His work in the St. Louis Museum and art school led in 1892 to his appointment as head of the art department at the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, and the success of this department was due largely to his ability in acquisition and selection. Here and later at the St. Louis exposition he successfully advocated the inclusion of the so-called "minor arts" in the collections shown in the art building.

In 1894, under the authority of the United States Bureau of Education, he traveled widely abroad to examine and report upon methods used in foreign schools and museums of art; and after repeated service as commissioner, representing the United States at expositions in Europe, he was chief of the department of art of the St. Louis world's fair of 1904. The planning and construction of its art building as a permanent structure, to serve after the fair as an art museum for the city, was due largely to his efforts, and after the removal of the collections in the earlier museum to the new location, he worked unceasingly to augment and improve them. He had already, in 1895, been elected a member of the City Council, where he served a four-years' term.

He died suddenly in London while on a professional trip.

Achievements

• As a teacher Halsey Cooley Ives inspired his pupils with lasting respect and affection. As an organizer, administrator, and protagonist of the popularization of art, he was a power not only in his own community but throughout the country. As a a member of the City Council, he labored for the recognition by the city of a public museum of art as a legitimate object of municipal support. He secured at that time legislation that ultimately aided in establishing the museum as a city institution, with a stated tax for its upkeep, and thenceforward his efforts were exerted entirely to strengthen its position. In addition, he received special medals for his services from the directors of the Chicago and St. Louis fairs and from the French government. His landscape "Waste Lands, " which won a silver medal at the Portland exhibition of 1905, is now owned by the St. Louis Museum.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Halsey Cooley Ives, LL. D. 1847-1911

    (This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)

Views

Quotations: "Art should be a matter of every-day enjoyment and use to every normally-constituted man, woman, and child. "

Connections

On February 21, 1887, Ives married Margaret A. Lackland of St. Louis, who bore him two children.

Father:

Hiram DuBoise Ives

Mother:

Teresa (McDowell) Ives

Spouse:

Margaret A. Lackland

References

• Halsey Cooley Ives, LL.D., 1847-1911, Founder of the St. Louis School of Fine Arts, First Director of the City Art Museum of St. Louis