Howard Chandler Christy was an American artist and illustrator, famous for the "Christy Girl" - a colorful and illustrious successor to the "Gibson Girl" - who became the most popular portrait painter of the Jazz Age era.
Background
Christy, Howard Chandler was born on January 10, 1873 in Morgan County, Ohio, United States, the son of Francis M. Christy. Although the Ohio farmlands might seem an unexpected birthplace for one of America's most prolific and best-known illustrators, it was clear early on that Howard Chandler Christy was destined for a career in art.
Education
Howard attended early school in Duncan Falls, Ohio. He then studied in New York at the Art Students League from 1890 to 1891 and then at the National Academy under William Merritt Chase, first at Chase's summer retreat at Shinnecock, Long Island, and then at his 10th Street Studio.
Christy initially intended to study "serious" art, but the financial realities of life in turn-of-the-century New York soon required that Christy find a reliable means of earning a living. This need became even more acute with the Wall Street Crash of 1895, which wiped out the reserves of Christy's benefactor back home. With no prospect of further financial support from his family, Christy began to explore the field of magazine illustration. In these early days, Christy's economic security was far from secure - he rarely had enough money, even to hire models. Nonetheless, he kept at it, and within the year his work found acceptance from the editors at Life magazine, as well as a commission to illustrate In Camphor. a novel by Rose B. Woodyear. Soon after, the publishing firm of Dodd, Mead, and Company signed Christy to illustrate Shakespeare's Hamlet for their forthcoming edition, which led to more commissions to illustrate historical works.
Christy's commercial art career advanced rapidly - by the time he was twenty-five his work was in regular demand by newspaper, magazine, and book publishers. His fortunes so much improved, Christy felt it was even possible to marry. Then Christy learned of the destruction of the U.S. battleship Maine in Havana harbor. He immediately sought, and received, commissions to cover the Spanish-American War for a number of New York periodicals. Christy's tour as war correspondent was spent following the exploits of Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders unit in their campaigns in Cuba, and his drawings earned him celebrity back in New York. His success guaranteed him commissions with all the major publishers of the day. These commissions were what ultimately led to the birth of his most enduring image - the Christy Girl.
Intended as just one of a series of sketches, the original Christy Girl was a picture of a soldier's sweetheart. In the words of Katherine Kominis, writing for the Dictionary of Literary Biography, the Christy Girl embodied "a mixture of charm and social grace, innocence and gaiety." She became so popular, and so recognizable, that she set the style for women's fashion for years. She was featured on magazine covers, in story illustrations, and on posters. So great was her popularity that entire books and albums were devoted to her image, including The Christy Girl and The American Girl (both published in 1906) and Liberty Belles: Eight Epochs in the Making of the American Girl (1912). Christy's illustrative talents were highly sought after for novels and books of poetry as well, and he illuminated the words of such authors as Longfellow, Tennyson, and Sir Walter Scott. He illustrated seven of James Whitcomb Riley's books and the twelve-volume memorial edition of that same author's Complete Works.
He settled in Ohio with his daughter, and established a studio in a converted barn on his parents' property. For the next nine years he worked from his Ohio home, using local men and boys as models but bringing women models in from New York. This highly productive time saw him working from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, and much of his best work comes from this period. In 1912 he was introduced to a young model, Nancy Palmer, who came out to Ohio to work with him.
Christy's country idyll was not to last - in 1915, he moved back to New York, certain that the United States was about to get into World War I and desirous of assisting in the war effort. Soon he was producing some of the images that are the most famous of his works: recruitment posters for the armed forces, many featuring Nancy Palmer. Among the best known of these images are Gee, I Wish / Were a Man. I'd Join the Navy and I Want You. For the Navy, both of which appeared in 1917. And the collaboration between artist and model took a new turn during this period - upon obtaining a divorce from his first wife, Christy married Palmer in 1919. When the war was over, Christy found himself in great demand as portraitist to the elite, with clients ranging from President Warren G. Harding to Amelia Earhart. His social cachet was at its height, and he enjoyed his celebrity to the fullest. His biggest coup of the period was to be named as one of the judges for the first Miss America pageant, along with Norman Rockwell and other notables of the day.
One of the most beloved of Christy's images of American history, familiar to most schoolchildren even today, was the mural We the People, which was taken on a cross country tour on the Freedom Train. In 1939 he took up the theme once again, producing the 20 x 30 foot The Signing of the Constitution, displayed today in the U.S. Capitol building. Soon after its unveiling, the United States again found itself at war, and Christy once again supplied his talents to aid the effort through propaganda and recruitment posters. He continued his indefatigable productivity in the post-war years, still in great demand as an illustrator and portraitist, until his death in 1952 from illness following a heart attack.
Quotations:
"Every morning I spend fifteen minutes filling my mind full of God, and so there's no room left for worry thoughts."
Connections
Howard married Maybelle Thompson in 1898 with whom he had a daughter Natalie. They separated in 1910 and divorced only in 1919. He again married Nancy May Palmer on August 14, 1919.
In the early 1930s, Howard met Elise Ford who became his model for the murals on Café des Artistes wall. Forty years his junior, she became Christy's companion until his death at age 80. They had a daughter named Holly (Holly Christina Longuski née Holly Ford) born in 1939 while he was painting Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States.
Great Illustrator of America - Howard Chandler Christy
Christy was only 22 years old when the first illustration of "Christy Girl" was published in «The Century», and like his contemporaries, Benda, Franklin Booth, Frank Craig, Harrison Fisher, he was a young artist in New York at the time when the magazines required such images. At the same time, Christy's work soon began to be in demand. As a student, Christy received in 1895 an order from «The Century».