George Albert Frost (December 23, 1843 – November 13, 1907) was an American artist of the 19th century. He was born in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

and had a studio in

North Cambridge, Massachusetts North Cambridge, also known as "Area 11", is a neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S ...

for several years. He studied under Nicolas de Keyser at the Academy Royale de Belgique in Antwerp. His paintings were mostly landscapes, and he is considered a member of the

White Mountain art White Mountain art is the body of work created during the 19th century by over four hundred artists who painted landscape scenes of the White Mountains of New Hampshire in order to promote the region and, consequently, sell their works of art. I ...

group of painters.

Career

Frost was born in Boston in 1843. He left school at age eleven to work on a farm where he had no opportunity to follow his artistic inclinations. At the outbreak of the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

, he enlisted and served for more than two years. In 1865 he joined Colonel Franklin L. Pope's division of the

Western Union The Western Union Company is an American multinational financial services company, headquartered in Denver, Colorado. Founded in 1851 as the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company in Rochester, New York, the company cha ...

surveying party to

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

for which he produced sketches. In 1866 he was assigned to

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...

with the purpose of selecting a route to connect a telegraph line from

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...

(

Russian-American telegraph Russian Americans ( rus, русские американцы, r=russkiye amerikantsy, p= ˈruskʲɪje ɐmʲɪrʲɪˈkant͡sɨ) are Americans of full or partial Russian ancestry. The term can apply to recent Russian immigrants to the United Stat ...

). He exhibited at the San Francisco Art Association in 1874, then studied at the Belgian Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Antwerp, with Nicolas de Keyser from 1874 to 1876, and for the next ten years had a studio in

. In 1883 he produced his earliest known White Mountain work. In 1885 he accompanied George Kennan on a second trip to Siberia to record the life of Russian exiles, during which time Frost painted several Siberian scenes. The trip was commissioned by ''

The Century Magazine ''The Century Magazine'' was an illustrated monthly magazine first published in the United States in 1881 by The Century Company of New York City, which had been bought in that year by Roswell Smith and renamed by him after the Century Associatio ...

'', and Frost and Kennan took numerous photographs which later were given to the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

and are now housed in the Library's Prints and Photographs Division. Selections from the George Kennan Collection in Meeting of Frontiers consists of 256 photographs taken in a wide range of locations in Siberia. Frost's drawings, some of which were copied from photographs taken during the trip, were used to illustrate Kennan's book, ''Siberia and the Exile System''.George Kennan Papers at Library of Congress
/ref> For a good many years, Frost had a summer home in

Brownfield, Maine Brownfield is a town in Oxford County, Maine, United States. The population was 1,631 at the 2020 census. Brownfield is home to the Stone Mountain Arts Center. History The area was once territory of the Pequawket Abenaki Indians, whose main ...

, near the Conway area of

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec to the nor ...

. He painted many scenes along the

Saco River The Saco River (Abenaki: ''Sαkóhki'') is a river in northeastern New Hampshire and southwestern Maine in the United States. It drains a rural area of of forests and farmlands west and southwest of Portland, emptying into the Atlantic Ocean ...

. He was a member of the Boston Art Club and exhibited there during the years 1896 to 1908. His last known address was Cambridge, Massachusetts. His works are at the California State Library and the California Historical Society.

''Franconia Notch''

Signed and dated lower right: G. A. Frost. 1883. Oil on canvas, 28 x 48 inches. Private collection The vista into

Franconia Notch Franconia Notch (elev. ) is a major mountain pass through the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Dominated by Cannon Mountain to the west and Mount Lafayette to the east, it lies principally within Franconia Notch State Park and is traversed by ...

from the south became known as the "Artist's View." Boston artist George Albert Frost expands our understanding of the White Mountains with an imaginative interpretation of Franconia Notch. Classically composed, with dark foliage framing the left side of the canvas and an expansive open space in the middle ground, giving way to atmospheric mountains in the distance, the notch is presented as an Arcadian idyll. Franconia Notch's appeal as a subject may reflect that life in the area was still slow-paced. Its virgin landscape was as yet hardly altered by railroads, hotels, and related improvements.

Personal life

George A. Frost was married in 1882 to Adelia Dunham. They had two sons: Paul Rubens Frost (1883–1957), a notable landscape gardener, and Norman Wentworth Frost, a teacher and charter member of the American Esperanto Club.

Exhibits

Concord, New Hampshire, Consuming Views: Art and Tourism in the White Mountains, 1850–1900, September 16, 2006 through October 8, 2007, #16

Bibliography

* . * Campbell, Catherine H. ''New Hampshire Scenery''. Canaan, New Hampshire: Phoenix Publishing, 1985. * Chadbourne, Janice H. and Karl Gabosh and Charles O. Vogel, ed. ''The Boston Art Club Exhibition Record, 1873-1909''. Madison, Connecticut: Sound View Press, 1991. * ''Consuming Views: Art & Tourism in the White Mountains, 1850–1900''. Concord NH: Hanover NH: New Hampshire Historical Society; Distributed by University Press of New England, 2006. * Falk, Peter Hastings, ed. ''Who Was Who in American Art, 1564-1975''. 3 vols. Madison, Connecticut: Sound View Press, 1999. * Henderson, John J., "19th Century Artists in the White Mountains of New Hampshire," Heart of New Hampshire, Fall 2005. * Henderson, John J. and Roger E. Belson, "Art & Tourism in the White Mountains, 1850-1900," American Art Review, Vol. XIX, No. 2, 2007, 109.

Footnotes

External links

Chronology

New Hampshire Historical Society

{{DEFAULTSORT:Frost, George Albert 1843 births 1907 deaths 19th-century American painters American male painters 20th-century American painters American landscape painters Royal Academy of Fine Arts (Antwerp) alumni Artists from Boston People from Brownfield, Maine 19th-century American male artists 20th-century American male artists Hudson River School painters