Beatrice Fenton

Beatrice Fenton American sculptor and educator born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 12, 1887, best known for her whimsical fountains.. Inspired by Rosa Bonheur she decided to become an animalier , so began drawing animals at the Philadelphia Zoo. Impressed with the drawings her father, Dr. Thomas Hanover Fenton, an art patron and head of the Philadelphia Art Club, showed them to a family friend, Thomas Eakins. Eakins found the drawings “too flat” and suggested that Fenton “get some clay and mold it.” Fenton then enrolled in a sculpture class taught by A. Stirling Calder on 1903 and her future was set.[1]

From 1904 to 1912 she studied with Charles Grafly[2]

Fenton taught sculpture at what is now the Moore College of Art and Design from 1942-1953.[3]

Fenton was a member of the National Sculpture Society. and her Nereid Fountain is featured in the NSS exhibition of 1929.[4] Her Seaweed Fountain is included in the Brookgreen Gardens collection.[5]

She died in Philadelphia in 1983.

References

  1. ↑ James-Gadzinski, Susan and Mary Mullen Cunningham, American Sculpture in the Museum of American Art of the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts, Museum of American Art of the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts and University of Washington Press, Seattle 1997 p 225
  2. ↑ Rubinstein, Charlotte Streifer, American Women Sculptors, G.K. Hall & Co., Boston 1990 p 159
  3. ↑ Opitz, Glenn B, Editor, Mantle Fielding's Dictionary of American Painters, Sculptors & Engravers, Apollo Book, Poughkeepsie NY, 1986
  4. ↑ Contemporary American Sculpture, The California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Lincoln Park, San Francisco, The National Sculpture Society 1929
  5. ↑ Proske, Beatrice Gilman, Brookgreen Gardens Sculpture, Brookgreen Gardens, 1968 p 244