George Harvey was a famous artist of the 19th century who has made significant contributions in the realm of art. Although he is revered for his landscapes, he had originally begun his character as a miniaturist.
Background
George Harvey was born on February 1, 1806, in Saint Ninians, United Kingdom. He was the son of George Harvey, a watchmaker, and Elizabeth Jeffrey. Soon after his birth his parents removed to Stirling, where George was apprenticed to Mr McLaren, a bookseller on Bow Street.
Education
George was apprenticed to Mr McLaren, a bookseller on Bow Street. His love for art having, however, become very decided, in his eighteenth year he entered the Trustees' Academy on Picardy Place in Edinburgh. Here he so distinguished himself that in 1826 he was invited by the Scottish artists, who had resolved to found a Scottish Academy, to join it as an associate.
Career
Not much of his past is known except for the fact he had a career drawing miniatures in England before his arrival in the United States. He did not offer many contributions in the first two years, during which he would wander in the remote parts of the country, hunting, and trapping. He did not more than scrubbing mere prose and poetry and draw and sketch in Michigan, Ohio and various parts of Canada.
George Harvey was working as a miniature painter in New York City by 1825. He had been elected as an associate to the National Academy of Design by 1828 and had moved to Boston. George had made the first of six trips to London by 1830 to improve his skills. George was modest about his accomplishments and a prolific and successful artist. When he had come back to 1832, his health was deteriorating due to overwork.
He had to give up miniature painting for some time. He had bought a tract of land and built a house at Hastings-on-Hudson at about 1834. From this time onwards, he put the focus on landscape painting. He became famous for his small-format atmospheric watercolors. George Harvey had exhibited 213 works in 1844, that included 22 portraits as well as landscape miniatures at the Boston Athenaeum. Harvey had traveled a great deal and gathered a lot of experience that can be seen in his works.
George Harvey had a studio in the New York City in the 1840s. He had lived in Boston during the 1850s. By the 1870s, he was back in Brooklyn and New York City and stayed there until he permanently returned to England by 1873. He had planned to create and market an elaborate album, containing engravings of significant American landscapes. He had been intrigued by the magnificent atmospheric effects of the climate in America, which had been significantly different from those in England.
George Harvey had been recording the impressions in a series of watercolor paintings and sketches. Harvey had published his portfolio "Atmospheric Landscapes" in 1841 that had engravings from William J. Bennett as well. Four of the engravings were collectively titled the "Scenes of the Primitive Forest of America at the Four Periods of the Year" and had been issued as aquatints in 1841 under the patronage of Queen Victoria. But the portfolio had been too expensive and only 250 copies were ever sold.
This had led to the discontinuation of the project. Harvey had even transcribed many of the impressions on glass lantern slides so that American extraordinary landscapes could be introduced to the English audiences for lectures.
Harvey’s paintings were amazing. One would easily get lost in the beauty following the gentle diagonal curve of the Erie Canal that would lead the viewer’s eye along the towpath. The eyes would wander past the packet boat and settle in the distant villages of Pittsford, New York, outside the city of Rochester.
George Harvey’s keen interest in the varying effects of the atmospheric conditions on American landscapes during the different times of day can be surmised from the paintings. He was knighted in 1867. He died at 21 Regent Terrace in Edinburgh on January 22, 1876. He is buried in Warriston Cemetery against the east wall, in the overgrown area just south of the former east gate.
George Harvey adhered to the artistic traditions of Romanticism.
Membership
In 1829 George was elected a fellow of the Royal Scottish Academy; in 1864 he succeeded Sir John Watson Gordon as president, a role which he held until 1876.
Connections
George was married firstly to Eliza Margaret Carstairs and secondly to Margaret Muir.