A Muralist's Study
Kenyon Cox (1856-1919)
"Venice" [drapery study for central figure],
ca. 1893
Graphite drawing
Prints & Photographs Division
Exchange, Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, 1945 (195.7a)
Digital ID# ppmsca-05390
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Muralist painter Kenyon Cox, who worked in the academic style
befitting an American renaissance in art, made several preparatory
sketches for his murals, covering each in a grid with exacting
measurements. In 1893 the architect Charles McKim asked Cox to
create a mural entitled Venice for the new Walker Art
Museum at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. His success led
McKim to recommend him to the Library of Congress in 1895. He received
a commission to paint two lunettes in the Southwest Gallery, The
Arts and The Sciences. He exhibited his preparatory
drawings at the Architectural League in New York to great acclaim
and won work for other public spaces.
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