Roswell Weidner (September 18, 1911September 22, 1999) was an American artist known for his

paintings Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

, charcoal and pastel

drawings Drawing is a form of Visual arts, visual art in which an artist uses instruments to mark paper or other two-dimensional surface. Drawing instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, various kinds of paints, inked brushes, colored pencils, ...

, and

prints In molecular biology, the PRINTS database is a collection of so-called "fingerprints": it provides both a detailed annotation resource for protein families, and a diagnostic tool for newly determined sequences. A fingerprint is a group of conserve ...

. His subject matter included still life, landscapes, and portraits. He was a student at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) city school and country school in

Chester Springs Chester Springs is an unincorporated community in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is centered on West Pikeland Township, and extends into Charlestown Township, Upper Uwchlan Township, Wallace Township, East Nantmeal Township, ...

, and the Barnes Foundation. He worked in the

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

Arts Project during the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

and in a shipyard as an expediter during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. Weidner began teaching at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1938. He was associated with the academy for 66 years, first as a student and later as a teacher, until his retirement in 1996.

Early life and training

Roswell Weidner was born in

Reading, Pennsylvania Reading ( ; Pennsylvania Dutch: ''Reddin'') is a city in and the county seat of Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city had a population of 95,112 as of the 2020 census and is the fourth-largest city in Pennsylvania after Philade ...

on September 18, 1911. His father, Harry, was an

iron puddler An iron puddler (often merely puddler) was a worker in iron manufacturing who specialized in puddling, an improved process to convert pig iron into wrought iron with the use of a reverberatory furnace. Working as a two-man crew, a puddler and he ...

who lost his job and the family savings in the

. Harry Weidner worked on road crews as part of WPA and made

bootleg liquor Moonshine is high-proof liquor that is usually produced illegally. The name was derived from a tradition of creating the alcohol during the nighttime, thereby avoiding detection. In the first decades of the 21st century, commercial dist ...

. Weidner's mother, Almeda Hughes, who only had a fourth grade education, taught him his multiplication tables before he went to school. Weidner's youth included hunting and fishing with his father, which provided still life subjects for his early artwork. He was a member of the

Reading Senior High School Reading Senior High School, colloquially known as The Castle on The Hill, is a 9–12 public high school in Reading, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1927 and is part of the Reading School District. It is the largest traditional high school ...

art club which took frequent trips to nearby art shows. The instructor for the art club was Italo L. De Francesco who later became the Art Director, then President of

Kutztown University Kutztown University of Pennsylvania (Kutztown University or KU) is a public university in Kutztown, Pennsylvania. It is part of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) and is accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher ...

from 1959-1967. De Francesco was instrumental in Weidner's admission to the Reading Museum drawing classes while he was still in high school. In 1930, Weidner received a scholarship from Reading Senior High School in

Pennsylvania 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, ...

to attend the country school of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) in

. Weidner got odd jobs at the school including working for the English gardener mowing lawns, weeding, cleaning out the swimming pool, and doing dishes. This gave Weidner opportunities to work outside and enjoy nature and the outdoors. Weidner was known for his energy and strength which was needed to maintain the gardens on this large property. He attended the country school until 1934 when PAFA closed it as a year-round school. Weidner was awarded the

Cresson Traveling Scholarship The Cresson Traveling Scholarship, also known as the William Emlen Cresson Memorial Traveling Scholarship, is a two-year scholarship for foreign travel and/or study awarded annually to art students at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Phi ...

in 1935. He completed his studies at PAFA's city school in Philadelphia in 1936. He also studied at the Barnes Foundation in Merion, PA, from 1934-1936. Weidner met Doris (Dorcas) Kunzie at Chester Springs Art School whom he married in 1938.

Works Progress Administration

1938-Portrait of Dox Thrash by Roswell Weidner (carborundum etching)

In 1936, the

(WPA) accepted Weidner for its National Youth Administration program. For the NYA, Weidner worked at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in the library cataloging books. In the 1989 Smithsonian Archives of American Art interview, Weidner pointed out that the PAFA library at the time didn't have art books but rather first editions "like Uncle Tom's Cabin". Art students at the time didn't have access to color reproductions and there were very few modern art books. Weidner turned 25 in September 1936 and aged out of the NYA. At that point he was moved to the WPA Art Project. In a 1986 interview with David R. Brigham, Weidner said that he created drawings in the margins of the booklets that the children could color in. He was later assigned to the Museum Project in West Philadelphia and created animals for dioramas for museums. He requested a transfer to the Painting Section where he had to create one oil painting per month. The paintings were given to Federal Buildings including schools. Much of this art has been lost. Finally, he worked in the WPA Graphics Arts Workshop (Print Section) in Philadelphia with

Dox Thrash Dox Thrash (1893–1965) was an African-American artist who was famed as a skilled Drafter, draftsman, master printmaker, and painter and as the co-inventor of the Carborundum printmaking process.Donnelly, Michell"The Art of Dox Thrash" The Encycl ...

, Michael J. Gallagher and

Hugh Mesibov Hugh Mesibov (December 29, 1916 – March 25, 2016 ) was an American abstract expressionist artist who began his career as a federal artist for the Works Progress Administration during the Great Depression and later became a member of the 10th St ...

. Weidner created a ''Portrait of Dox Thrash'' (lithograph) while they worked together. Prints of most of the 21 etchings, lithographs or carborundum prints created by Roswell Weidner while on WPA are in the

Philadelphia Free Library The Free Library of Philadelphia is the public library system that serves Philadelphia. It is the 13th-largest public library system in the United States. The Free Library of Philadelphia is a non-Mayoral agency of the City of Philadelphia gover ...

print collection.

Artist and teacher

1947-The Stone House by Roswell Weidner (oil on canvas)

In 1938, Weidner was offered and accepted a teaching position at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He left the WPA at this time and was not part of WPA when it was liquidated in 1943. His early successes in art exhibitions at the Carnegie International in Pittsburgh, Corcoran Biennial in Washington, D.C., and PAFA Annual Exhibitions in Philadelphia resulted in his inclusion in the 1939 New York World’s Fair representing Pennsylvania. Weidner's teaching and art were interrupted in 1941 with the advent of

. He was laid off from PAFA and took night courses to be able to read

blueprints A blueprint is a reproduction of a technical drawing or engineering drawing using a contact print process on light-sensitive sheets. Introduced by Sir John Herschel in 1842, the process allowed rapid and accurate production of an unlimited number ...

. He was hired by the John H. Mathis & Company Shipyard in

Camden, NJ Camden is a city in and the county seat of Camden County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Camden is part of the Delaware Valley metropolitan area and is located directly across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At the 2020 U. ...

, as an

expeditor An expeditor is someone who facilitates a process. It is a position or role found within project management, construction, purchasing, production control, and restaurants. One example of this is a person in a restaurant who coordinates actions betw ...

, marine pipefitter
layout man
and marine draftsman. During this time Weidner got special permission to paint pictures of men working on the docks at the shipyard. One of these paintings is in the collection of the

Independence Seaport Museum The Independence Seaport Museum (formerly the Philadelphia Maritime Museum) was founded in 1961 and is located in the Penn's Landing complex along the Delaware River in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The collections at the Independence Seaport Muse ...

. In 1944, as the war was ending, another construction company offered Weidner a job in South America but at the same time he received an offer to return to teaching at PAFA. He decided to take the teaching position. Also in 1944, Roswell and Doris Weidner bought a farm outside Philadelphia in Christiana, PA with the money he saved while working at the shipyard. Weidner returned to teaching painting, drawing and lithography at PAFA and the Philadelphia College of Art. The farm and surrounding area including the Mercer's Mill Covered Bridge were frequent subjects of Weidner's art in the 1940s and 1950s. In 2001 the farm was the subject of a novel by Jack Lindeman, "Appleseed Hollow", in which he describes life on the farm in the late 1950s. During his career as an instructor at PAFA, Weidner taught various art media (graphics arts,

lithography Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German a ...

, painting, and drawing) and levels of students but he was also involved with decisions regarding the school. As a faculty member he worked with the administration on a number of issues most notably the use of the

Belgravia Hotel The Belgravia Hotel, also known as Peale House, is a historic building in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. It was listed on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places on June 3, 1982. ...

(which was later named the Peale House) as studios for advanced students and faculty. Weidner took over management of the PAFA evening school and boosted attendance from 28 to over 200 per semester in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Weidner also served as president of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts Fellowship (alumni association) from 1955-1967.The Fellowship of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 75th Anniversary 1897-1972 (booklet), pages=8-11, published by PAFA Fellowship

Growth of artistic style

Until the mid-1950’s Roswell Weidner was content to paint in the style of his early teachers at the Academy that included

Henry McCarter Henry Bainbridge McCarter (1864-1942) was an American illustrator and painter known for his influence on the modernism, modernistic art movements. McCarter worked as an illustrator in New York before becoming an instructor at the Pennsylvania Ac ...

George Matthews Harding George Matthews Harding (1882–1959) was an American painter, author-illustrator, and a muralist. He served as an official war artist during World War I and World War II. Life and career George Matthews Harding was born in Philadelphia. At ...

, Daniel Garber, and Joseph Pearson Jr. He described himself as a Jack-of-all Trades since he was proficient in landscape, portrait, figure and

still life A still life (plural: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, m ...

painting. Influences of post-impressionist painting at the Barnes Foundation and of Japanese art permeated his work. Despite the popularity of subsequent trends, such as the use of color in ‘ Op Art”, the hard edges of ‘ Pop Art’ and the simplicity of ‘

minimalism In visual arts, music and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in post–World War II in Western art, most strongly with American visual arts in the 1960s and early 1970s. Prominent artists associated with minimalism include Don ...

', Weidner continued to paint nature in a realistic style. His work became more ambitious in scale and incorporated the Oriental concept of space while retaining Western form of modeling, light and perspective. He also returned to drawing – large, powerful but delicately executed charcoals. In the 1960's and early 1970's, Weidner's landscapes mostly focused on

Smithville, Burlington County, New Jersey Smithville was a village in Eastampton Township, Burlington County, New Jersey. It was originally established as Shreveville in 1831 by Jonathan and Samuel Shreve as a textile village on the Rancocas Creek. It was purchased by Hezekiah Bradley ...

; Cheyney, Pennsylvania; and the area around Danville, Vermont, and the coast of Maine particularly near

Bristol, Maine Bristol, known from 1632 to 1765 as Pemaquid (; today a village within the town) is a town in Lincoln County, Maine, United States. The population was 2,834 at the 2020 census. A fishing and resort area, Bristol includes the villages of New Har ...

. In 1956, Weidner and his first wife divorced, and Weidner lost the Christiana farm which had been a source of inspiration for his landscapes. In 1957, he married Marilyn Kemp. During this time, the growing Weidner family would spend entire summers at locations so that he could paint. Weidner also drove his emerald green Ford van to Maine to paint views of oceans waves crashing against the shore. In 1974, Weidner discovered the New Jersey Pine Barrens. At his campsite, deep in the

Wharton State Forest Wharton State Forest is the largest state forest in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is the largest single tract of land in the state park system of New Jersey, encompassing approximately of the Pinelands northeast of Hammonton. Its protected ...

, he found solitude where he could work undisturbed from morning until dusk, following the changing colors and light of the seasons. He called it his “Paradise”. In an article in American Artist in 1980,

Bill Scott (artist) Bill Scott (born 1956 Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania) is a contemporary abstract painter and printmaker who works and lives in Philadelphia. Scott studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from rom 1974 to 1979, and with the painter Ja ...

describes Weidner's style in this way:

"In his landscapes, Weidner takes a greater liberty in changing and rearranging the colors and shapes he sees than in his figure paintings. The dominant element in his work continues to be the intensity and vibrancy of his colors - strong violets, blues and greens. While his earlier work was "fluid"-looking, his paintings now have the dry surface and brilliant color of pastel."

The ''Philadelphia Inquirer'' Art Critic from 1962 to 2012 was Victoria Donohoe, who wrote the following about Weidner's 1981 show at the Marian Locks Gallery in Philadelphia:

"Weidner's talent was nurtured on Renoir and apparently on Monet's paintings of his famed garden at Giverny. Weidner hasn't attained the extraordinary refinement of their observation of momentary effects of light and color, but there's a robust directness in Weidner's work and fidelity of record as he zeroes in on the ground plane without looking skyward at all. To a larger extent than before, the quality of the artist's own reactions is now felt, as he goes about finding his inspiration in the outer aspects of nature. Weidner takes the colors of nature and heightens them considerably. He has shown increasing curiosity about color. Now he sometimes gets combinations to work that shouldn't. In this show, particularly in the pastels with the softer, quieter range of hues, Roswell Weidner can be appreciated as the fine landscapist he is. It's through a display such as this that artists may hope to regain appreciation of the fact that a natural source of art's interest, and one of its major functions, is to give expression to one's own locality and to living life naturally."

Selected exhibitions

1953-Roswell Weidner at Beryl Lush Gallery Show

1966-Wm Penn Memorial Museum Photos 0001

Roswell Weidner Exhibition at the Newman Galleries 1987

1993-Roswell Weidner and Ed Rendell at PA Convention Center Opening

* WPA Exhibitions, 1938-1942 *

Corcoran Gallery of Art The Corcoran Gallery of Art was an art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, that is now the location of the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design, a part of the George Washington University. Overview The Corcoran School of the Arts & Design ...

Sixteenth Biennial, Washington, D.C., 1939 * "American Art: Graphic Arts",

1939 New York World's Fair The 1939–40 New York World's Fair was a world's fair held at Flushing Meadows–Corona Park in Queens, New York, United States. It was the second-most expensive American world's fair of all time, exceeded only by St. Louis's Louisiana Purchas ...

, New York City, New York * "Directions in American Painting"

Carnegie Museum of Art The Carnegie Museum of Art, is an art museum in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Originally known as the Department of Fine Arts, Carnegie Institute and was at what is now the Main Branch of the Carnegie Library of Pittsbur ...

, Pittsburgh, PA, 1941 * "Artists for Victory: An Exhibition of Contemporary American Art : Paintings, Sculpture, prints" sponsored by Artists for Victory, Inc. 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 ...

, New York, New York, 1942 *

National Academy of Design The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American artists, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse, Asher Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E. Thompson, Charles Cushing Wright, Ithiel Town, and others "to promote the fin ...

116th Annual Exhibition of contemporary American painting and sculpture, New York City, New York, 1942 * The Biennial at the

, Washington, D.C., 1943 *

120th Annual Exhibition of contemporary American painting and sculpture, New York City, New York, 1946 * "Roswell Weidner", Philadelphia Artist's Gallery, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, 1948 * "Paintings by Roswell Weidner" at the Beryl Lush Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 1953 * "The Peale House Galleries of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts present and Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings by Roswell Weidner", Philadelphia, PA, 1966 * "Paintings and Drawings by Roswell Weidner" at the William Penn Memorial Museum (aka,

State Museum of Pennsylvania The State Museum of Pennsylvania is a non-profit museum at 300 North Street in downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. It is run by the state through the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission and was created to preserve and interpret the region ...

), Harrisburg, PA. Sponsored by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1966 * "Roswell Weidner Paintings & Drawings Exhibition Selected from 1938 to the present" at the McCleaf Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 1970 * "The New Deal and the Artist: An Exhibition of the 40th Anniversary of the Founding of WPA", Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 1975 * "Paintings and Drawings of the Out-of-Doors by Roswell Weidner" Newman Galleries, Philadelphia, PA, February 1978 * "Summer of 1978" New Paintings and Pastels by Roswell Weidner, Woodmere Art Gallery (aka, Woodmere Art Museum), Philadelphia, PA, Nov-Dec 1978 * "Southern New Jersey Landscape" Long Beach Island, Foundation of The Arts and Sciences, July 1980 * "The Pine Barrens by Roswell Weidner" Marian Locks Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, May 1981 * "Roswell Weidner" Peale House Galleries of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, 1985 * "Roswell Weidner Paintings & Pastels of the '80's" Newman Galleries, Philadelphia, PA, April 1987 * "WPA - A Philadelphia Retrospective", Philadelphia, PA 1988 * "Living Treasures" University City Science Center, Philadelphia, PA, February 1998 * "Arts at Crozer"

Crozer-Chester Medical Center Crozer Health is a four-hospital health system based in Delaware County, Pennsylvania and serving Delaware County; northern Delaware and parts of western New Jersey. History In 1893, the 48-bed Chester Hospital opened to serve the growing popu ...

, Upland, PA, November 1990 to January 1991 * "A Tribute to Roswell Weidner" Museum of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, August 2001 * "Ode to the Jersey Pine Barrens" The

Noyes Museum The Noyes Museum of Art is an art museum. It styles itself as the only fine arts museum in southern New Jersey. The museum opened in 1983 in Galloway Township, New Jersey. Due to lack of funds for needed repairs, the main Galloway building i ...

of Art, Loveladies, NJ, July 2002 * "A retrospective of the work of Roswell Weidner, 1911-1999" at The Gallery at Bristol-Myers Squibb, Lawrence Township, NJ, 2004

Selected collections

Chester County History Center Chester County History Center (CCHC), formerly the Chester County Historical Society, is a nonprofit historical society, founded in 1893, dedicated to collecting, preserving, and exhibiting the history of Chester County, Pennsylvania, and the s ...

Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum holds the records of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States (1933–1945). Located on the grounds of Springwood, the Roosevelt family estate in Hyde Park, New ...

Artifact Collection, National Archives * Free Library of Philadelphia WPA Collection * Frick Art Reference Library *

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 is ...

* Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) *

Pennsylvania Convention Center The Pennsylvania Convention Center is a multi-use public facility in the Market East, Philadelphia, Market East section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, designed to accommodate conventions, exhibitions, conferences and other events. The "L"-shaped ...

* Picker Art Gallery, Dr. Luther W. Brady Collection, Colgate University *

Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...

Reading Public Museum The Reading Public Museum is a museum in West Reading, Pennsylvania. The museum's permanent collection mainly focuses on art, science, and civilization. It also has a planetarium and a arboretum. Collection The museum's art collection contai ...

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

* The

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

* U.S.

General Services Administration The General Services Administration (GSA) is an independent agency of the United States government established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. GSA supplies products and communications for U.S. gover ...

(GSA) * WPA Artwork in Non-federal Repositories

Recognition

* 1935 Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Art (PAFA) 140th Annual,

* 1936 PAFA 141st Annual, Toppan Drawing Prize * 1943 PAFA Fellowship Prize * 1965 PAFA 160th Annual, Philadelphia Watercolor Club Dawson Memorial Award * 1972

Philadelphia Watercolor Club Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

Dawson Memorial Award * 1975 Philadelphia Watercolor Club Dawson Memorial Award The School Catalogue of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 1976-1977, page 8. * 1975 PAFA Fellowship at the Woodmere Gallery The Percy Owens Award for a Distinguished Pennsylvania Artist * 1977 PAFA Fellowship The

Thornton Oakley Thornton Oakley (March 27, 1881 – April 4, 1953) was an American artist and illustrator. Biography Thornton Oakley was born on Sunday, March 27, 1881, in Pittsburgh. He was the son of John Milton Oakley and Imogen Brashear Oakley. He gradua ...

Memorial Prize The School Catalogue of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 1978-1979, page 39. * 1985 Who Was Who in America 1985-present * 1996 PAFA Dean's Award for Distinguished Service to the School * 1998 "A Philadelphia Treasure" Liberty Bell Award, presented by Mayor Edward G. Rendell, City of Philadelphia, PA

Gallery

1935.213.1 HIGH RES.jpg, ''Portrait of a Man'' by Roswell Theordore Weidner, c. 1935, oil on canvas. Courtesy of the

, Reading, Pennsylvania. R2021-16 WEIDNER-1940 7.tif, ''The Country Fair'' by Roswell Weidner, c. 1938, oil on canvas. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 1938-Industrial Town -2 by Roswell Weidner (carborundum etching).jpg, ''Industrial Town 2'' by Roswell Weidner, c. 1938 (see

carborundum printmaking Carborundum mezzotint is a printmaking technique in which the image is created by adding light passages to a dark field. It is a relatively new process invented in the US during the 1930s by Hugh Mesibov, Michael J. Gallagher, and Dox Thrash, a ...

). Shown at the

1938-Winter on Spring Street by Roswell Weidner, Collection of the Library of Congress (print).jpg, ''Winter on Spring Street'' by Roswell Weidner, c. 1938, lithograph. Collection of the

Merry-Go-Round by Roswell Weidner 1948.jpg, ''Merry-Go-Round'' by Roswell Theordore Weidner, c. 1948, oil on canvas. Courtesy of the

, Reading, Pennsylvania. R2021-16 WEIDNER-1960 21.jpg, ''Dorcas Combing her hair'' by Roswell Weidner, c. 1942, oil on canvas. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts R2021-16 WEIDNER-2012 27 1.tif, ''

Burlesque A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects.

Queen'' by Roswell Weidner, c. 1955, oil/tempera on burlap. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. (Interior of the

Trocadero Theatre The Trocadero Theatre (opened as the Arch Street Opera House) is a historic theater located in Chinatown in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It offered musical comedies, vaudeville, opera, and burlesque. The Trocadero Theatre was refurbished for use a ...

in Philadelphia, PA) R2021-16 WEIDNER-2012 27 2.jpg, ''Concrete, Steel, and Sky'' by Roswell Weidner, 1958, casein on canvas. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts R2021-16 WEIDNER-1965 4.jpg, ''The Willow Tree'' by Roswell Weidner, 1964, charcoal on paper. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 1965-Tree Stump and Wild Flowers by Roswell Weidner.jpg, ''Tree Stump and Wild Flowers'' by Roswell Weidner, 1965, oil on canvas. R2021-16 WEIDNER-1985 54.jpg, ''Upstream'' by Roswell Weidner, 1979, pastel on paper. Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 1980-The Dam by Roswell Weidner.jpg, ''The Dam'' by Roswell Weidner, 1980, pastel on paper.

Personal life

Weidner's personal life could be divided into two parts based on his marriages. The first part of his life continued up to the divorce from his first wife, Doris ("Dorcas") Kunzie Weidner, in 1956. Doris and Roswell went to art school together at

and PAFA. They bought and lived on a farm in Christiana, Pennsylvania, and a home in Philadelphia near PAFA. They painted, exhibited in art shows, judged art shows, and worked on the farm together. Doris Kunzie Weidner continued to paint and live on the farm after their divorce until her death in 2000. The second part of his personal life started in 1957 when Weidner married his second wife, Marilyn Kemp Weidner. Marilyn and Roswell Weidner lived in Center City, Philadelphia. Marilyn also painted with Roswell but their true partnership was their interest in conservation of art both on paper and canvas. Marilyn Kemp Weidner founded the

Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts The Conservation Center for Art & Historic Artifacts (CCAHA), located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was founded by Marilyn Kemp Weidner in 1977, with funding from thNational Endowment for the Humanitiesand in response to the growing problem of pa ...

(CCAHA) in 1977 in Philadelphia, PA, with the help of her husband. Roswell Weidner retired from teaching at PAFA in 1996 at the age of 85. Weidner died in his home in Philadelphia with his wife Marilyn and his daughters by his side. His ashes were scattered in the New Jersey Pine Barrens.

References

External links

PAFA Archives
- Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Digital Archives
Historic Yellow Springs
- information about Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts country school
AskArt.com
- more paintings, exhibition and biographical information on Roswell Weidner.
The Roswell Weidner papers, 1930-1989
held by the

Smithsonian Archives of American Art The Archives of American Art is the largest collection of primary resources documenting the history of the visual arts in the United States. More than 20 million items of original material are housed in the Archives' research centers in Washingt ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weidner, Roswell 20th-century male artists Artists from Pennsylvania 1911 births 1999 deaths Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts faculty Federal Art Project artists People of the New Deal arts projects