Collections record Beta

Collection Record Detail

Object Name

Drawing

Object Number

1951-30-1

Description

Ink drawing completed by Austin Purves (1900-1977) as a design for a Spring Hill School publication. Ink on white textured paperboard with dark gray reverse. Rectangular pencil border containing black in drawing of a house and landscape scene above a small water scene with three ducks. At center in black lettering, "The/SPRING HILL/School." Signed below in smaller black lettering, "A. Purves." Written in pencil below design, "Full size dimensions of Announcement/ 8 5/8" x 5"." Black lettering on reverse, "Austin Purves/142 East 18 St.,/New York/N.Y./Proposed Cover/for Springhill School/Announcement/Booklet dimensions 5" x 8 5/8"/ 3/23/35." Board edges bound with masking tape.

Provenance

Born in Philadelphia, Austin M. Purves Jr. (1900-1977) lived in the East Litchfield section of Litchfield for the last 40 years of his life. Purves studied art at the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts and the Académie Julian in Paris, France, before opening a studio in New York, where he was director of the day and night schools at the Cooper Union. After moving to Litchfield, Purves taught art at Bennington College and at Yale Art School and was a member of the Architectural League of New York, the National Society of Mural Painters, and the (then newly-formed) Hartford Art School. Over the course of his career Purves did commission work for R. H. Macy & Co., the Folger Memorial Library in Washington, D.C., the American Battle Monument in Draguignan, France, the 1939 World’s Fair, various churches, ship lines and private clients, among others. In addition to commission work, Purves drew primarily from people and nature for his own personal sketches and paintings.

Comment

Spring Hill School was a private school modelled on a philosophy of progressive education. Founded by Dorothy Bull and Mabel Foster Spinney in Litchfield, Conn., the school operated from 1926 to 1939. This drawing was donated with materials now found in the Spring Hill School Collection (LHS archives, 1951-30-0).