![Cassatt Electra Havemeyer and mother](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Cassatt_Electra_Havemeyer_and_mother.jpg)
Louisine Waldron Elder Havemeyer (July 28, 1855 – January 6, 1929) was an
art collector
A private collection is a privately owned collection of works (usually artworks) or valuable items. In a museum or art gallery context, the term signifies that a certain work is not owned by that institution, but is on loan from an individual ...
,
feminist
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
, and
philanthropist
Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...
. In addition to being a
patron
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
of
impressionist art
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
, she was one of the more prominent contributors to the
suffrage movement in the United States. The impressionist painter
Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas (, ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, ; 19 July 183427 September 1917) was a French Impressionist artist famous for his pastel drawings and oil paintings.
Degas also produced bronze sculptures, prints and drawings. Degas is es ...
and feminist
Alice Paul
Alice Stokes Paul (January 11, 1885 – July 9, 1977) was an American Quaker, suffragist, feminist, and women's rights activist, and one of the main leaders and strategists of the campaign for the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ...
were among the renowned recipients of the
benefactor's support.
Background
Louisine Waldron Elder was born in New York City on July 28, 1855, to a merchant George W. Elder (1831–1873) and his wife, Matilda Adelaide Waldron (1834–1907). She was the second of four children: Anne Eliza Elder, later Mrs. Henry Norcross Munn (1853–1917), Adaline Deliverance Mapes Elder, later Mrs. Samuel Twyford Peters (1859–1943), and brother George Waldron Elder (1860–1916).
Life in Paris
Shortly after her father's death, Louisine Elder and her family travelled to Europe for a three-year stay. They set sail on May 25, 1873, aboard the ''S.S. Calabria'', accompanied by their extended family, aunt Amanda McCready and family, and cousin
Mary Mapes Dodge
Mary Elizabeth Mapes Dodge (January 26, 1831 – August 21, 1905) was an American children's author and editor, best known for her novel '' Hans Brinker''. She was the recognized leader in juvenile literature for almost a third of the nineteen ...
, the editor of ''
St. Nicholas Magazine'' and author of ''
Hans Brinker; or the Silver Skates''. Mary Mapes Dodge's sister Sophie Mapes Tolles was living in Paris with her friend
Emily Sartain
Emily Sartain (March 17, 1841 – June 17, 1927) was an American painter and engraver. She was the first woman in Europe and the United States to practice the art of mezzotint engraving, and the only woman to win a gold medal at the 1876 World F ...
, studying art in the atelier of
Evariste Luminais and boarding in the ''pensionnat'' of Mme. Del Sarte, widow of
François Del Sarte, famed teacher of the art of expression. Louisine and her sister Addie joined Sophie Mapes Tolles and Emily Sartain in boarding at Mme. Del Sarte's, and it was during this time that
Emily Sartain
Emily Sartain (March 17, 1841 – June 17, 1927) was an American painter and engraver. She was the first woman in Europe and the United States to practice the art of mezzotint engraving, and the only woman to win a gold medal at the 1876 World F ...
introduced Louisine to
Mary Cassatt
Mary Stevenson Cassatt (; May 22, 1844June 14, 1926) was an American painter and printmaker. She was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (now part of Pittsburgh's North Side), but lived much of her adult life in France, where she befriended Edgar De ...
. Fellow Philadelphians, Cassatt and Sartain had studied together at the
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts
Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Maryl ...
in the early 1860s and travelled to Europe together in the fall of 1871. During this time, Mary Cassatt took Louisine Elder under her wing, becoming a mentor and encouraging her to make her first art acquisition, a pastel by Edgar Degas. As time passed, particularly after Louisine married
Henry O. Havemeyer
Henry Osborne Havemeyer (October 18, 1847 – December 4, 1907) was an American industrialist, entrepreneur and sugar refiner who founded and became president of the American Sugar Refining Company in 1891.
Havemeyer was the third generation of h ...
, Cassatt became an advisor to the Havemeyers, helping to build their art collection and facilitating the working relationship which they would have with the
Impressionist Artists
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating ...
, including
Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas (, ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, ; 19 July 183427 September 1917) was a French Impressionist artist famous for his pastel drawings and oil paintings.
Degas also produced bronze sculptures, prints and drawings. Degas is es ...
,
Édouard Manet
Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.
Born ...
,
Camille Pissarro
Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro ( , ; 10 July 1830 – 13 November 1903) was a Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, St Thomas (now in the US Virgin Islands, but t ...
and
Claude Monet
Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...
. A lifelong friendship developed between Louisine Havemeyer and Mary Cassatt, who later made several pastels of Louisine and her children.
Art collection
Together with her husband, Louisine would build perhaps the finest art collection in America. Her three-story mansion at Fifth Avenue and East 66th Street in New York was filled with the finest possible examples of works by
Manet
A wireless ad hoc network (WANET) or mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a decentralized type of wireless network. The network is ad hoc because it does not rely on a pre-existing infrastructure, such as routers in wired networks or access points ...
,
El Greco
Domḗnikos Theotokópoulos ( el, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. "El G ...
,
Rembrandt
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally consid ...
, and
Corot
CoRoT (French: ; English: Convection, Rotation and planetary Transits) was a space telescope mission which operated from 2006 to 2013. The mission's two objectives were to search for extrasolar planets with short orbital periods, particularly th ...
. The home was decorated 1889-1890 by
Louis Comfort Tiffany
Louis Comfort Tiffany (February 18, 1848 – January 17, 1933) was an American artist and designer who worked in the decorative arts and is best known for his work in stained glass. He is the American artist most associated with the Art NouveauL ...
and
Samuel Colman
Samuel Colman (March 4, 1832 – March 26, 1920) was an American painter, interior designer, and writer, probably best remembered for his paintings of the Hudson River.
Life and career
Born in Portland, Maine, Colman moved to New York City ...
, who made it an elegant showplace for their patron's varied and important collections.
Henry Clay Frick
Henry Clay Frick (December 19, 1849 – December 2, 1919) was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a major ...
,
J.P. Morgan, and Mrs.
Isabella Stewart Gardner
Isabella Stewart Gardner (April 14, 1840 – July 17, 1924) was a leading American art collector, philanthropist, and patron of the arts. She founded the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.
Gardner possessed an energetic intellectual cur ...
were among the collectors with which Mr. and Mrs. Havemeyer would have known and competed.
Family life
On August 22, 1883, a decade after her father's death, Louisine married
Henry O. Havemeyer
Henry Osborne Havemeyer (October 18, 1847 – December 4, 1907) was an American industrialist, entrepreneur and sugar refiner who founded and became president of the American Sugar Refining Company in 1891.
Havemeyer was the third generation of h ...
of the
American Sugar Refining Company
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
.*
Louisine and Henry Osborne had three children:
*Adaline Havemeyer, a.k.a. Mrs. Peter H.B. Frelinghuysen — (1884–1963)
*Horace Havemeyer — (1886–1956)
*
Electra Havemeyer, a.k.a. Mrs. James Watson Webb — (1888–1960)
* ''(Prior to his marriage to Louisine, Henry had been married to Louisine's aunt Mary Louise Elder (1847–1897), but that marriage ended in divorce.)''
Legacy
In addition to her standing as an early and important collector of Impressionist art, Louisine Havemeyer was an advocate of women's rights.
Suffrage activist
After her husband's death in 1907, Mrs. Havemeyer focused her attention on the
women's suffrage movement
Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to gran ...
. In 1912 she lent her artistic collection to
Knoedler
M. Knoedler & Co. was an art dealership in New York City founded in 1846. When it closed in 2011, amid lawsuits for fraud, it was one of the oldest commercial art galleries in the US, having been in operation for 165 years.
History
Knoedler dat ...
's Gallery in New York to raise money for the cause.
In 1913, she founded the
National Woman's Party
The National Woman's Party (NWP) was an American women's political organization formed in 1916 to fight for women's suffrage. After achieving this goal with the 1920 adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the NW ...
with the radical suffragist
Alice Paul
Alice Stokes Paul (January 11, 1885 – July 9, 1977) was an American Quaker, suffragist, feminist, and women's rights activist, and one of the main leaders and strategists of the campaign for the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ...
. (The organization was previously known as the "Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage".) She repeated the money raising art exhibition at Knoedler's in 1915.
With the financial backing of Mrs. Havemeyer and others like her, Ms. Paul launched an increasingly confrontational series of protests that agitated for the right to vote. Paul's most famous efforts were the
1913 National Suffrage Parade, which produced a riot on the eve of President
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...
's first inauguration and, as a member of the
Silent Sentinels
The Silent Sentinels, also known as the Sentinels of Liberty, were a group of over 2,000 women in favor of women's suffrage organized by Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party, who protested in front of the White House during Woodrow Wilson's ...
, the wartime picketing of the White House. During the latter, Paul used portions of the President's speeches heralding the defense of democracy in Europe which she masterfully contrasted with the denial of liberty to American women. When jailed for obstructing traffic in 1917, she hunger struck, bringing tremendous pressure to bear on the Congress and Wilson Administration. The
Nineteenth Amendment, which extended voting rights to women, was debated by Congress, gained the necessary 2/3 votes in 1919, was sent to the states for ratification, and gained the necessary 3/4 of states ratifying in 1920.
Louisine Havemeyer became a well-known suffragist, publishing two articles about her work for the cause in ''
Scribner's Magazine
''Scribner's Magazine'' was an American periodical published by the publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons from January 1887 to May 1939. ''Scribner's Magazine'' was the second magazine out of the Scribner's firm, after the publication of ' ...
''. The first, entitled "The Prison Special: Memories of a Militant", appeared in May 1922, and the other, "The Suffrage Torch: Memories of a Militant" appeared in June the same year.
In 1912 and 1915, Mrs. Havemeyer organized exhibitions of art works from her collection at
Knoedler
M. Knoedler & Co. was an art dealership in New York City founded in 1846. When it closed in 2011, amid lawsuits for fraud, it was one of the oldest commercial art galleries in the US, having been in operation for 165 years.
History
Knoedler dat ...
Gallery to raise funds to support suffrage efforts.
She participated in marches, much to the dismay of her children , down New York's famed Fifth Avenue and addressed a standing room only audience at
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhatta ...
upon the completion of a nationwide speaking tour. A famous photograph of Mrs. Havemeyer shows her with an electric torch, similar in design to that of the
Statue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty (''Liberty Enlightening the World''; French: ''La Liberté éclairant le monde'') is a List of colossal sculpture in situ, colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor in New York City, in the U ...
, among other prominent suffragists. Her attempt to burn an effigy of President Wilson outside the White House in 1919 drew national attention.
After a period of failing health, Mrs. Havemeyer died in 1929. Mrs. Havemeyer is interred at
Green-Wood Cemetery
Green-Wood Cemetery is a cemetery in the western portion of Brooklyn, New York City. The cemetery is located between South Slope/ Greenwood Heights, Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, Borough Park, Kensington, and Sunset Park, and lies several bl ...
in
Brooklyn
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
,
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
. The terms of her will left a few choice paintings to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
in New York City. The final bequest, made possible by the generosity of her children, included nearly two-thousand works that enrich nearly every segment of the museum's collections.
Many Tiffany pieces from her Fifth Avenue home, including a magnificent peacock mantelpiece decoration, and a chandelier are on permanent display at the
University of Michigan Museum of Art
The University of Michigan Museum of Art in Ann Arbor, Michigan with is one of the largest university art museums in the United States. Built as a war memorial in 1909 for the university's fallen alumni from the Civil War, Alumni Memorial Hall ori ...
. A portion of the Music Room furniture suite is on view at the
Shelburne Museum
Shelburne Museum is a museum of art, design, and Americana located in Shelburne, Vermont, United States. Over 150,000 works are exhibited in 39 exhibition buildings, 25 of which are historic and were relocated to the museum grounds. It is located ...
.
Family legacy
Louisine's children would continue to build upon their family's legacy as art collectors. Louisine's daughter
Electra Havemeyer Webb
Electra Havemeyer Webb (August 16, 1888 – November 19, 1960) was a collector of American antiques and founder of the Shelburne Museum.
Early life
Electra Havemeyer was born on August 16, 1888. She was the youngest child of Henry Osborne Have ...
collected American fine and folk paintings and sculpture that helped to found the
Shelburne Museum
Shelburne Museum is a museum of art, design, and Americana located in Shelburne, Vermont, United States. Over 150,000 works are exhibited in 39 exhibition buildings, 25 of which are historic and were relocated to the museum grounds. It is located ...
. The museum showcases a "collection of collections" in fine examples of early American homes and public buildings; a general store, meeting house, log cabin, and even a steamship dot the grounds. Her great-grandson,
John Wilmerding
John Currie Wilmerding Jr. (born April 28, 1938), is an American professor of art, collector, and curator, and is best known as a prolific author of books on American art.
Early life
Wilmerding was born in Boston, Massachusetts on April 28, 19 ...
, is a well known professor of art, collector, and
curator
A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...
, and is best known as a prolific author of books on American art. Her daughter Adaline and son Horace Havemeyer, and grandsons Horace Havemeyer, Jr. and Harry W. Havemeyer bequeathed several works from
Vermeer
Johannes Vermeer ( , , see below; also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch Baroque Period painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. During his lifetime, he was a moderately succe ...
,
Goya
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 174616 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and ...
,
Corot
CoRoT (French: ; English: Convection, Rotation and planetary Transits) was a space telescope mission which operated from 2006 to 2013. The mission's two objectives were to search for extrasolar planets with short orbital periods, particularly th ...
,
Manet
A wireless ad hoc network (WANET) or mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a decentralized type of wireless network. The network is ad hoc because it does not rely on a pre-existing infrastructure, such as routers in wired networks or access points ...
, and others to the
National Gallery of Art
The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...
.
Paintings bequeathed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art
See also
*
Havemeyer
Resources
* Louisine Havemeyer.1993. ''Sixteen to Sixty: Memoirs of a Collector''. New York: Ursus Press.
* Louisine W. Havemeyer. 1922. ''The Suffrage Torch: Memories of a Militant'' Scribners (May), pp. 528–538.
* Louisine W. Havemeyer. 1922. ''The Prison Special: Memories of a Militant'' Scribners (June) pp. 661–675.
* Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen. 1993
''Splendid Legacy: The Havemeyer Collection''New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art.
References
External links
review of an art exhibit in the March 23, 1993 issue of the ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''
Louisine Elder Havemeyer profile from
Saint Michaels College
*
*
The Havemeyer Family Papers relating to Art Collecting' in
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 F ...
Archives.
Archives directory Frick Collection (February 20920)
Online edition of Frits Lugt's ''Les marques de collections de dessins & d'estampes''''The H. O. Havemeyer Collection'' a collection catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries
''Splendid Legacy: The Havemeyer Collection'' from Google Books
{{DEFAULTSORT:Havemeyer, Louisine
American women's rights activists
American art collectors
Burials at Green-Wood Cemetery
Women art collectors
American philanthropists
Louisine
1855 births
1929 deaths
American suffragists
People associated with the Metropolitan Museum of Art
American art patrons