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Louise Hammond Willis Snead (, Willis;
Snead exhibited for years in the New York Watercolor Society and at the
"The Language of Monkeys"
by Louis Hammond Willis, 1891 {{DEFAULTSORT:Snead, Louise Hammond Willis 1868 births 1958 deaths 19th-century American women writers 19th-century women textile artists 19th-century textile artists 19th-century American artists 19th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century American artists 20th-century American women artists 19th-century American writers 20th-century American writers 20th-century American women writers Artists from Charleston, South Carolina American illustrators American composers American art educators American embroiderers Pseudonymous women writers Art Students League of New York alumni Portrait miniaturists Wikipedia articles incorporating text from A Woman of the Century
pen name
A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen na ...
, Louis Hammond Willis; December 14, 1868 - October 7, 1958) was an American artist, writer, and composer. Her art specialized in miniature painting, illustrations, and needlework. She lectured on Persian rugs, wrote articles of various topics under a masculine pseudonym, and even composed a march
March is the third month of the year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. It is the second of seven months to have a length of 31 days. In the Northern Hemisphere, the meteorological beginning of spring occurs on the first day of March ...
.
Early life and education
Louise Hammond Willis was born inCharleston, South Carolina
Charleston is the largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina, the county seat of Charleston County, and the principal city in the Charleston–North Charleston metropolitan area. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint o ...
, December 14, 1868. From her mother, Elizabeth Louise Hammond, Louise inherited a love of nature and a scientific mind. From her father, Major Edward Willis, she inherited ambition, an indomitable will, and perseverance. The Willis home was the meeting place of people of talent and distinction.
She was graduated with first-honor medal and diploma from the Charleston Female Seminary. Her art studies were carried on in Charleston, under E. Whittock McDowell, and in New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
under James Carroll Beckwith and Harry Siddons Mowbray
Harry Siddons Mowbray (August 5, 1858 – 1928) was an American artist. He executed various painting commissions for J.P. Morgan, F.W. Vanderbilt, and other clients. He served as director of the American Academy in Rome from 1902–1904.
Biog ...
. She studied drawing, painting and modeling under William Merritt Chase
William Merritt Chase (November 1, 1849October 25, 1916) was an American painter, known as an exponent of Impressionism and as a teacher. He is also responsible for establishing the Chase School, which later would become Parsons School of Design. ...
, Frank DuMond
Frank Vincent DuMond (August 20, 1865 – February 6, 1951) was one of the most influential teacher-painters in 20th-century America. He was an illustrator and American Impressionist painter of portraits and landscapes, and a prominent teac ...
, Irving Ramsey Wiles
Irving Ramsey Wiles (April 8, 1861 – July 29, 1948) was an American artist, born in Utica, New York.
In the early 20th century, Wiles was a popular exponent of American grand manner portraiture as redefined by the work of John Singer Sargent, ...
, and others at Art Students League of New York
The Art Students League of New York is an art school at 215 West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City, New York. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists.
Although artists may st ...
, New York School of Art and in European galleries, as well as being a pupil of Theodora Thayer and Alice Beckington
Alice Beckington (July 30, 1868 – January 4, 1942) was an American painter.
Born in St. Charles, Missouri, Beckington studied art at the Art Students League of New York, where she was a pupil of J. Carroll Beckwith; she also studied for a mon ...
. Snead also completed a post-graduate course in literature and languages.
Career
While still a student, Snead had charge of the painting and drawing classes at Charleston Female Seminary. She was the assistant teacher in the Carolina Art School. Believing that everything helps everything else, she applied herself to the study of architecture, and in so doing, developed plans. While her specialty wasportraiture
A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expressions are predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the person. For this re ...
, her illustrations and pen-and-ink drawings were meritorious, while she also excelled in the art of fine and artistic needle work, point-laces and art embroideries.
Snead exhibited for years in the New York Watercolor Society and at the American Society of Miniature Painters
The American Society of Miniature Painters (ASMP) was an association of miniature painters, organized in March 1899.
The ten founding members of the ASMP included Virginia Richmond Reynolds, Isaac A. Josephi, William Jacob Baer, Alice Beckington ...
. She designed houseboats and model modern suburban homes for ten years. She received Honorable mention at the South Carolina Inter-State and West Indian Exposition
The South Carolina Inter-State and West Indian Exposition, commonly called the Charleston Exposition or the West Indian Exposition, was a multi-county fair and regional trade exposition held in Charleston, South Carolina from December 1, 1901 to ...
, 1902. Snead lectured on “The Magic Carpet," or the making of real Persian rugs. Other lectures were on topics of special interest to women's clubs, one being point laces. She illustrated a series of articles on the subject of point-lace making for ''Chautauqua
Chautauqua ( ) was an adult education and social movement in the United States, highly popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chautauqua assemblies expanded and spread throughout rural America until the mid-1920s. The Chautauqua br ...
Magazine''. Snead copied many antique embroideries from museums, in the line of art needlework. She was interested in handicraft
A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...
s, weaving, hammered brass, illuminated leather, tapestry
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads ma ...
and in all lines of interior decoration.
Snead was familiar with a half-dozen languages. She wrote both prose and poetry for magazines, her writings appeared over the pen name "Louis Hammond Willis." Snead contributed largely to women's magazines for fifteen years, and illustrated her own articles. She also played on a number of musical instruments. Having studied the theory of music, her compositions demonstrated originality. Snead composed approximately 20 songs and a march that was orchestrated by Victor Herbert
Victor August Herbert (February 1, 1859 – May 26, 1924) was an American composer, cellist and conductor of English and Irish ancestry and German training. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor, he is bes ...
and played by Patrick Gilmore
Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore (December 25, 1829 – September 24, 1892) was an Irish-born American composer and bandmaster who lived and worked in the United States after 1848. While serving in the Union Army during the U.S. Civil War, Gilmor ...
's Band.
Personal life
Snead made her home at 1 Wilson Avenue, Murray Hill, Flushing, Long Island, New York. She was a member of Daughters of the American Revolution, and the Pennsylvania Society of Miniature Painters. By religion, she was Protestant. Her recreations included landscape gardening, building stone pillars and walls, and making concrete garden furniture. On September 4, 1894, she married Harry Vairin Snead (1867–deceased) of New York City, son of Col. Thomas L. Snead of Virginia. They had one daughter, Louise Vairin Snead (1897-1984). Louise Hammond Willis Snead died inDarien, Connecticut
Darien ( ) is a coastal town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. With a population of 21,499 and a land area of just under 13 square miles, it is the smallest town on Connecticut's Gold Coast. It has the youngest population of any ...
, October 7, 1958.
Selected works
* ''Silver and gold'', 1916Notes
References
Attribution
* * *Bibliography
*External links
* *"The Language of Monkeys"
by Louis Hammond Willis, 1891 {{DEFAULTSORT:Snead, Louise Hammond Willis 1868 births 1958 deaths 19th-century American women writers 19th-century women textile artists 19th-century textile artists 19th-century American artists 19th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century American artists 20th-century American women artists 19th-century American writers 20th-century American writers 20th-century American women writers Artists from Charleston, South Carolina American illustrators American composers American art educators American embroiderers Pseudonymous women writers Art Students League of New York alumni Portrait miniaturists Wikipedia articles incorporating text from A Woman of the Century