In 1900 at the height of his fame, illustrator Howard Pyle founded the Howard Pyle School of Art in Wilmington, Delaware. His bold purpose was to train promising young artists to produce uniquely American work that would echo the nation’s spirit and challenge Europe’s artistic supremacy. Towards that end, Pyle championed imagination over technique and originality over imitation. Author and illustrator Alice Carter will explain how Pyle’s audacious experiment spawned six generations of remarkable students schooled in his methods. For although his own story has faded with the years, Pyle’s creative vision continues to be a dominant force in contemporary visual culture.
Tell the truth and do not make the work merely clever—for the world is growing tired of that—I feel it in the air – Howard Pyle
About the Speaker: Alice A. Carter is a writer, artist, Professor Emeritus at San Jose State University and former co-director of education at the Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco. Academic honors include San Jose State’s Outstanding Professor award, a Fulbright Fellowship in Cairo Egypt, the New York Society of Illustrator’s Distinguished Educator in the Arts award, and the Umhoefer Prize for Achievement in the Humanities. Carter’s illustration clients have included Lucasfilm Ltd., Rolling Stone magazine, The New York Times, and ABC Television. Carter’s publications include The Art of National Geographic: One Hundred Years of Illustration; The Red Rose Girls: An Uncommon Story of Art and Love; The Essential Thomas Eakins; Cecilia Beaux: A Modern Painter in The Gilded Age, The Drawings of Edwin Austin Abbey, and most recently Franklin Booth: Silent Symphony. Carter serves on the Board of Trustees at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge Massachusetts and is a member of the Hall of Fame Committee at the New York Society of Illustrators.
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Presentation is via Zoom, and will be recorded and available for 7 days for all registered participants. We will email out a Zoom link the day of the presentation, and email a link to the recording within 48 hours. Note: the Zoom link emailed out the day of the presentation only takes you to the live presentation; the link emailed out the day after will contain the recorded version.
Generously sponsored by the Haverford Trust Company.
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