Biography

William Chadwick (1879-1962) was an English-born artist who is regarded as one of the foremost practitioners of the school of American Impressionism that arose out of the artists’ colony at Old Lyme, Connecticut, in the early years of the 20th century.

Chadwick was born in Yorkshire, England, in 1879. In 1884, his father, a wool manufacturer, relocated the family to Holyoke, Massachusetts, for business reasons. Chadwick displayed an early aptitude for art, and after graduating from high school, he departed for New York City, enrolling in the Art Students League in 1898, where his instructors included John H. Twachtman, Kenyon Cox, Joseph R. DeCamp, and William Merritt Chase.

In the summer of 1901, Chadwick sailed to Europe, eventually visiting Rome, where he studied architecture and visited museums. He returned to the Art Students league for the 1901-02 winter term, and was encouraged by friends to spend time that summer at the then fledgling artists’ colony at Old Lyme, Connecticut, which was on its way to becoming a favorite retreat for American artists, led by the well-known Impressionist, Childe Hassan. The colony soon became the epicenter for an emerging form of American Impressionism, centered at the Florence Griswold House, where Chadwick resided while there. It was at this time that Chadwick, who until then had focused on portraiture and figurative art, began to turn his attention to landscapes, gradually absorbing the influences of the colony's older painters, particularly Willard Metcalf and Walter Griffin, and developing his own impressionistic style, marked by delicate and subtle tones.

In the spring of 1903, Chadwick exhibited at the Society of American Artists, his debut as a professional artist, and he became treasurer of the Art Students League. Over the next several years he divided his time between Connecticut in the summer months and New York during the academic year, sharing studio space with fellow Old Lyme artists Will Howe Foote and Harry Hoffman while in the city.

By the spring of 1907, Chadwick was confident enough to submit two of his paintings to the National Academy of Design for their annual exhibition, and a year later exhibited his work at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, which led to his being represented regularly at various venues. During a three-year sojourn to Europe from 1912-15, Chadwick began to extensively focus on impressionist landscapes, returning to Old Lyme in 1915 and purchasing a home in town with his wife, which became their residence for the next 40 years, with the exception of a two-year stay from 1924-26 in Savannah, Georgia, where Chadwick taught at the Telfair Academy.

Chadwick’s time in Savannah was marked by his continuing to perfect his distinctive Impressionist style emphasizing the en plein air effects of light and color, which he had employed in the preceding decade to produce such striking works as Old Lyme Winter, which has recently been called “a masterpiece of palette” by a contemporary curator. Several examples of the work Chadwick executed during his time in Georgia, incorporating a light, sunny color scheme and showcasing genre scenes of city and country life, form a permanent part of the Johnson Collection in Spartanburg, South Carolina, one of America’s most iconic repositories of regional art and the recipient of the Governor’s Award for the Arts, the highest arts distinction bestowed in the state. Chadwick is credited with being a major force in the flowering of the arts in Savannah, which became a regional center for artists following his time there. In 1927, the Telfair Academy honored Chadwick by hosting the first, and only, solo exhibition of his work during his lifetime, a showcase that was highly praised by reviewers.

Though his life always remained anchored in Old Lyme, Chadwick took frequent trips to explore new locales for his work, including Mohegan Island, Maine; Vermont; and the island of Bermuda, often accompanied by Will Howe Foote, Harry Hoffman, or Charles Ebert. Bermuda, in particular, is the setting for a small but important group of mature paintings executed by Chadwick, several of which reside in the permanent collection of the Bermuda National Gallery.

Chadwick’s work over the course of his lifetime has been said to reflect the influence of both French and American impressionism in its attention to atmospheric effects and the representation of quiet, personal scenes that often depict individuals lost in reverie. Though he never enjoyed great personal success during his career, he was extremely well-respected by his artist-colleagues in the Lyme Art Association. In 1963, a year after his death, the Association held a memorial show of his work. Referencing the exhibition, the artist Nelson C. White wrote that “William Chadwick’s work is distinguished for a sensitive and subtle Impressionism … he evokes the mood of shifting seasons, the effects of sunshine and cloud shadows, and the laurel of late spring and the snow of winter.”

In August 1978, Chadwick gained national exposure with the opening at the Lyme Historical Society of a major retrospective, William Chadwick, 1879-1962: An American Impressionist, which was organized by the R.H. Love Galleries of Chicago and which circulated among several museums in the eastern United States. Today, Chadwick’s virtuosity is regarded as an indelible component of early 20th century American Impressionism.

In addition to his tenure at the Telfair Academy, Chadwick’s career also included faculty positions at the Teacher’s College of Columbia University and the City College of New York. He held memberships in the National Academy of Design and the Salmagundi Club in New York City, as well as maintaining a lifelong commitment to the Lyme Art Association in Lyme, Connecticut.

Examples of Chadwick’s work can currently be found in many prestigious venues, including the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Connecticut; the Lyman Allen Museum in New London, Connecticut; the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.; the George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum in Springfield, Massachusetts; the Johnson Collection in Spartanburg, South Carolina; and the Bermuda National Gallery in Hamilton, Bermuda.

Written October 2016 by Brian Flon, author of "Hell's Kitchen Requiem" (2014), available as an e-book at Amazon, ITunes, and Barnes & Noble.