Maurice Brazil Prendergast

Background

Maurice Brazil Prendergast was born on October 10, 1858 in St. John's, Newfoundland Colony, British North America (present-day St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada). He was a son of Maurice Prendergast, a tradesman, and Malvina (Germaine) Prendergast. Maurice also had a twin sister, whose name was Lucy, and a younger brother Charles Prendergast, who was a painter.

In 1861, when his father's grocery business failed, the family moved to Boston.

Education

Maurice finished his formal education by the time he was fourteen years old. In 1891, he went to Paris, where he studied under the guidance of Jean Paul Laurens at the Académie Julian. Also, Prendergast attended Académie Colarossi, where Gustave-Claude-Etienne Courtois and Jean-Joseph Benjamin-Constant were among his mentors.

During one of his early stays in Paris, he met the Canadian painter James Morrice, who introduced him to English avant-garde artists Walter Sickert and Aubrey Beardsley, all ardent admirers of James McNeill Whistler.

Career

In 1886, Maurice and his brother Charles worked their way to England on a cattle boat. After that, they may have gone to Paris as well. Returning to Boston, they worked at routine jobs in order to save $1, 000 for a return to Europe. In 1891, Maurice left for Paris to study art. He made rapid progress in three years, working from the model, rather than from casts. Also, Prendergast was fascinated with the life and movement in the parks, boulevards and cafés.

When Maurice returned to America in 1894, he was an accomplished watercolorist, who assimilated qualities from Edouard Manet, James McNeill Whistler, Edgar Degas, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard and from Japanese prints. At that time, Prendergast was the first American artist to appreciate and understand the importance of Paul Cezanne. Until 1905, the Prendergast brothers lived together in Winchester, Massachussets, where their principal means of support was a frame-making shop.

Maurice's work was included for the first time in a public exhibition at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1896. There was a one-man show in Boston the next year, and from this time until his death, his paintings appeared in many exhibitions.

In 1898, Prendergast went to Venice, where he created some of his most enchanting watercolors. Arthur B. Davies invited him to join the other artists in the famous exhibition of "The Eight' in 1908, organized as a protest against the conservative tendencies of the National Academy of Design. In 1909, Maurice traveled to France again, and some time later, in 1911, to Italy. The influence of Paul Signac is perhaps to be observed from this period. The seven watercolors, that were included in the celebrated Armory Show in 1913, revealed Prendergast as a major figure in American painting, probably the greatest of his generation.

Prendergast went to Europe for the last time in 1914. On his return, he and his brother moved to New York City, where Maurice spent his last decade, working in a studio in Washington Square. During the last years of his life, the painter was increasingly isolated because of deafness.

During his lifetime, the painter also took part in many exhibitions, including Venice Biennale in 1920.

Achievements

• Maurice Brazil Prendergast was a well-known Post-Impressionist painter, who pioneered in introducing new directions in American art. He became famous for his highly personal style, with boldly contrasting, jewel-like colors and flattened, pattern-like forms, rhythmically arranged on a canvas.
  
  Today, Prendergast’s works are kept in the collections of different museums and galleries, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., the Courtauld Institute of Art in London, the Art Institute of Chicago and others.

Works

More photos

• painting

  • Woman with a Parasol

  • Holiday, Nahant

  • Treport Beach (also known as A Very Sunny Day, Treport)

  • Picking Flowers

  • St. Malo

  • Telegraph Hill

  • Two Women in a Park

  • Venetian Canal Scene

  • Italian flower market

  • Promenade at Nantasket

  • Monte Pincio

  • Head of a Girl (with Roses)

  • Ponte Della Paglia

  • Venice (unfinished)

  • Harbor, Afternoon

  • Feast of the Redeemer

  • Dieppe

  • Woman on Ship Deck, Looking out to Sea (also known as Girl at Ships Rail)

  • Surf, Cohasset

  • On the Beach, St. Malo

  • Central Park, New York City, July 4th

  • Street Scene

  • La Porte San Denis

  • The Grand Canal, Venice

  • At the Park

  • At the Shore (Capri)

  • Ladies in the Rain

  • Central Park

  • Maypole

  • Bathing Tents, St. Malo

  • The Race

  • Central Park

  • Umbrellas in the Rain

  • Shipyard Children Playing

  • The Piazza of St. Marks, Venice

  • South Boston Pier

  • Handkerchief Point (Coastal Scene)

  • Spring in Franklin Park

  • Fies Venice S. Pietro in Vol (also known as The Day Before the Fiesta, St. Pietro in Volte)

  • After the Storm

  • Riva degli Schiavoni

  • Beach at St. Malo

  • The Porch with the Old Mosaics, St. Mark's, Venice

  • May Day, Central Park

  • The Pretty Ships (also known as As the Ships Go By)

  • Circus Band

  • Handkerchief Point

  • Grand Canal, Venice

  • Children on a Raft

  • Assisi

  • Three Little Girls in Red

  • Children at the Beach

  • The Balloon

  • Figures on the Grass

  • Float at Low Tide, Revere Beach (also known as People at the Beach)

  • Sienna

  • Sunday Morning, Paris

  • May Day

  • The Tuileries Gardens, Paris

  • West Church, Boston (also known as Red School House, Boston or West Church at Cambridge and Lynde Streets)

  • Revere Beach

  • The Flying Horses

  • Small Fishing Boats, Treport, France

  • In Central Park, New York

  • Side Show

  • Skipping Rope

  • Lady on the Boulevard

  • Ponte della Paglia (also known as Marble Bridge)

  • Paris Omnibus

  • The Breezy Common

  • Franklin Park, Boston

  • Franklin Park, Boston

  • Grey Day

  • Ladies with Parasols

  • Strolling in the Park (also known as In the Park)

  • Venetian Palaces on The Grand Canal

  • Revere Beach

  • St. Mark's, Venice

  • Spring Flowers

  • Madison Square

  • April Snow, Salem

  • Notre Dame

  • Lady with a Red Sash

  • Band Concert

  • Lacemakers, Venice

  • Jumping Rope

  • Salem Willows (also known as The Promenade, Salem Harbor)

  • The Red Cape

  • Riva San Biagio, Venice

  • Holiday, Headlands

  • Beach Scene No. 4

  • Bed of Flowers (also known as Cannas or The Garden)

  • Chateaubriand s Tomb, St Malo (also known as St. Malo Chateaubriands Tomb)

  • Lady with Red Cape and Muff

  • Montparnasse

  • St. Malo (also known as Sketch, St. Malo)

  • Seascape

  • Sketch Figures on Beach (also known as Early Beach)

  • Pincian Hill, Rome (also known as Afternoon, Pincian Hill)

  • Venice

  • Market Scene

  • Summer Visitors

  • Shadow (also known as Children by a Window)

  • In the Luxembourg Gardens

  • Nantasket

  • Beach, St. Malo

  • Early Beach

  • Ladies Seated on a Bench (also known as Ladies in the Park)

  • Beach, St. Malo

  • The Paris Omnibus

  • Revere Beach

  • In the Library (also known as Three School Girls)

  • Evening on a Pleasure Boat

  • A Street in Rouen

  • The Orange Market

  • Easter Procession, St. Mark's

  • St. Mark's Lion, Venice

  • Low Tide

  • Revere Beach

  • Beach Scene, St. Malo

  • Low Tide

  • Rising Tide, St. Malo

  • The Mall, Central Park (also known as Steps, Central Park or The Terrace Bridge, Central Park)

  • Picnic with Red Umbrella

  • City Point Bridge

  • The Stony Beach, Ogunquit

  • Franklin Park, Boston

  • May Day, Central Park (also known as Central Park or Children in the Park)

  • Viewing the Ships

  • The Lido, Venice

  • Low Tide, Afternoon, Treport

  • Venetian Scene

  • Central Park (also known as Central Park, New York City)

  • Central Park, New York

  • Paris Boulevard in the Rain

  • Boston (also known as Park St., Boston)

  • Marine Park

  • Paris

  • Beechmont

  • Fiesta

  • Boston Harbor

  • Crescent Beach (also known as Crescent Beach, St. Malo)

  • Figures on the Beach

  • Surf, Nantasket

  • St. Malo

  • Beach at St. Malo

  • Low Tide

  • Splash of Sunshine and Rain

  • The Ocean Palace

  • Sienna Column of the Wolf

  • East River Park

  • Ponte della Paglia

  • The West Church (also known as Fountain at the West Church, Boston)

  • Evening Shower, Paris

  • Columbus Circle (New York)

  • Children at Play

  • Lighthouse at St. Malo

  • Summer Day

  • In the Park

  • In Luxembourg Gardens

  • St. Malo

  • Beach Scene with Lighthouse (also known as Children at the Seashore)

  • Ring around the Rosy

  • Charles Street, Boston

  • Nantasket Beach (also known as Handkerchief Point)

  • Green Dress

  • The Spanish Steps

  • The East River

  • St. Malo

  • Luxembourg Gardens

  • Seated Woman in Blue (also known as At the Cafe)

  • Can Can Dancer

  • Docks, East Boston

  • Along the Seine

  • Merry Go Round, Nahant

  • Monte Pincio, Rome

  • Roma Flower Stall (also known as Flower Stall or Roman Flower Stall)

  • Lady in a Pink Skirt

  • Courtyard Scene, Siena

  • Excursionists, Nahant

  • Revere Beach

  • Rainbow

  • Venice

  • Revere Beach, Boston

  • Horseback Riders

  • Figures under the Flag

  • South Boston Pier (also known as Atlantic City Pier)

  • Afternoon, Pincian Hill

  • Low Tide, Beachmont

  • The Bridle Path, Central Park

  • Figures on the Beach

  • May Party (also known as May Day, Central Park)

  • The Dancers

  • May Day, Central Park

  • Low Tide, Nantucket

• sketch

  • Sketchbook (The Boston Water-Color Sketchbook)

Views

Quotations: "We cannot invent ideas, we can only gather some of those in circulation since the beginning of the world. We endow them with the color and form of our own time."

Membership

Maurice was a member of a short-lived association of artists, known as "The Eight".

Connections

Father:

Maurice Prendergast

Mother:

Malvina (Germaine) Prendergast

Sister:

Lucy Prendergast

Brother:

Charles Prendergast

mentor:

Jean-Paul Laurens

mentor:

Gustave-Claude-Etienne Courtois

mentor:

Jean-Joseph Benjamin-Constant

References

• Maurice Prendergast: By the Sea This selection of works in a variety of media focuses on Maurice Prendergast’s creative process, as he imaginatively and innovatively captured the look and feel of coastlines from New England to France and Italy.
  2013
• Maurice Prendergast: Art & Design Spanning the artist's entire career, the volume interweaves an information on particular paintings with the intriguing story of Prendergast's life. This monograph reflects the many aspects of the artist's genius, from his early Impressionist street and beach scenes to his middle phase of pointillist still lifes and his later colourful, more flattened figural paintings.
  1997
• Maurice Prendergast: Paintings of America This book is the catalogue of a unique exhibition of Prendergast's works, taking place from May 16, 2003 to June 20, 2003 at the Adelson Galleries in New York City.
  2007