Background

Leon Kroll was born on December 6, 1884, in New York City, New York, United States. He was a son of Marcus Nathaniel Kroll, a violinist, and Henrietta Moss. An American violinist and composer William Kroll was Leon’s cousin.

Leon reveled his interest in art at the childhood. As a teenager, he made a strong decision to become an artist.

Education

Leon Kroll began his artistic education at the age of sixteen when he enrolled at the course of John Henry Twachtman at Art Students League. Two years later, Kroll entered the National Academy of Design. During two years he spent there the young man showed himself as a brilliant student. His paintings were marked by many awards and easily accepted by a jury on the university exhibitions.

Among such awards was a scholarship to visit the Byrdcliffe art colony in Woodstock in 1906 and Mooney Scholarship which allowed the young artist to pursue his training in Europe. Leon Kroll visited Belgium, Holland, Germany and by 1908, he came to Paris. At the capital of France, he became a student of the Julian Academy where he was taught by the realist painter Jean-Paul Laurens.

Traveling around Europe, Kroll discovered the art of such masters as Paul Cézanne, the impressionists Auguste Renoir, Claude Monet and Camille Pissarro who impressed the young man by their brilliant colors.

Kroll came back to the United States in 1911.

Career

Leon Kroll started his career as a teenager in 1900 when he became an assistant of that time head of the Art Students League of New York Charles Yardley Turner. It was he who advised his young colleague to continue his artistic way.

The debut solo exhibition of the artist was organized soon after his return from an educational trip around Europe in 1910 at the National Academy of Design. A year later, the institution provided him with an educational post. The artist showed himself as a talented educator that allowed him later teach art at the Art Students League, the Chicago Art Institute, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Maryland Institute of Art.

This time, Kroll got acquainted with George Bellows and some members of the American artist group ‘The Eight’, including Robert Henri, John Sloan, William Glackens, George Luks and others. Kroll participated at several exhibitions of the club. Due to the friendships, he had an opportunity to demonstrate his canvases at the Armory Show of 1913 where he sold almost all his works.

The exhibition pushed the growth of the artist’s professional career. He was more and more sought after for other shows where he earned many awards. A year after the notable Armory the artist started collaboration with the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. where he exhibited regularly from 1914 to 1953. Other show of the period included Panama–Pacific International Exposition in 1915, the exhibits at the Society of Independent Artists, the Art Institute of Chicago and the National Academy of Design.

The inspiration for the canvases presented at the above-mentioned shows was found on Monhegan Island in Maine where the artist returned regularly, in Colorado with its Rocky Mountains where Kroll went to portray the Travis family in 1917 and in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The artistic trips continued the following decade. The painter spent some time in Woodstock, and then went briefly to Europe.

As a leading artist of the period, Leon Kroll had many exhibitions, such as the Carnegie International Exhibition, the shows at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and within the Newport Art Association. A large retrospective of his art took place at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1924. From the next year to the end of the decade, Kroll lived with his wife in France.

During the 1930s, Leon Kroll created most of his best landscapes and figurative paintings. He participated at the Baltimore Pan-American Exhibition of 1931 and for the second time at the Carnegie International. His personal achievements in the artistic field were demonstrated at the couple of large retrospectives organized in 1935 and 1937 at the Carnegie Institute and the Worcester Museum in Massachusetts relatively.

In addition, Kroll also tried his hand as a muralist for the first time. From then on, he took part at the number of federal art projects consisting of the outer decoration of such municipal buildings as the U.S. Department of Justice, the auditorium at Johns Hopkins University, the Senate Chamber in the State Capitol of Indiana, and the war memorial in Worcester, Massachusetts. In 1943, he was appointed a Vice President of the National Institute of Arts and Letters.

The artist stayed active till the last years of his life contributing to several art organizations and working on paintings at his New York studio and in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Achievements

• 

  Leon Kroll was an accomplished artist whose figurative nude paintings, picturesque landscapes and still-life made a contribution to the development of international art. His canvases are recognized all over the world.
  
  During his lifetime, Kroll received a lot of prestigious awards such as the Logan Medal of the Arts, Benjamin Altman Prize (five times), Temple Gold Medal, Bronze Medal at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, Richard Greenough Memorial Prize, Maida Gregg Memorial Prize, Carol H. Beck Gold Medal and others. He was also named a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor and obtained President's Medal for a lifetime of distinguished service to American art.
  
  Nowadays, the artist’s heritage is preserved at many public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, both in Washington, D.C., the Los Angeles County Museum, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art and others.
  
  In 2004, a painting by Kroll was purchased at Sotheby's in New York City for $198,400.

Works

More photos

• painting

  • Tess Kroll Pergament, the Artist's Sister

  • Leo Ornstein at the Piano

  • In the Hills

  • Scene in Central Park

  • Rondout

  • Reclaimed Land, Riverside Drive

  • Basque Landscape

  • In the Country

  • Nude in a Blue Interior

  • The Gay Bridge

  • Santa Fe Hills

  • Summer Days, Camden Maine, the Bellows Family

  • Cape Ann

  • Gull Rock, Monhegan

  • Miss Carolyn Edmunson

  • Portrait of Theresa Rogers

  • Fauve Portait of a Woman

  • Portrait of a Redhead

  • Bouquet

  • Good Harbor Beach, Gloucester

  • Girls at an Exhibition

  • Mary

  • Still Life with Fruit

  • The Red Jacket

  • Sleep

  • Four Girls Combing their Hair

  • Nude with Yellow Hat Looking in a Mirror

  • Girl Reading

  • Standing Nude with Mirror

  • Nickerson's Pool

Membership

• National Academy of Design , United States

  1927

• Boston Art Club , United States

• American Academy of Arts and Letters , United States

• National Arts Club , United States

• Art Club of Philadelphia , United States

• Salmagundi Art Club , United States

• Society of Independent Artists , United States

Interests

• Artists

  Paul Cézanne, Auguste Renoir, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro

Connections

Leon Kroll married Genevieve Domec on October 18, 1923.

Father:

Marcus Nathaniel Kroll

Mother:

Henrietta Moss

Spouse:

Genevieve Domec

Cousin:

William Kroll

mentor:

John Twachtman

mentor:

Jean-Paul Laurens

colleague:

Charles Yardley Turner

References

• Leon Kroll A monograph on the artist by American Artists Group
  1946
• Leon Kroll: The Rediscovered Years
  1970
• Leon Kroll: A Spoken Memoir A book by Nancy Hale
  1983
• Leon Kroll: Revisited The book by Valerie Ann Leeds contains 48 color plates and 9 black and white photographs