Collections record Beta

Collection Record Detail

Object Name

Sketch Book

Object Number

1953-17-1

Description

A 43-page sketchbook that has been taken apart and individually encapsulated. Various pencil, ink and watercolor sketches. Four pages of notes written in pencil by the artist. Some of the sketches include pencil and ink notes on them by the artist. Sketches include mostly nature and landscape sketches including one sketch of an unknown man's face. Most pieces are unsigned. On the first page of the collection of sketches is note about the sketchbook by the artist at the bottom in pencil: "Notes and Sketches, many from/memory done as/exercises in observation/MP. 1933."

Comment

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.