JULIE HELLER GALLERIES

 ARTHUR WESLEY DOW 

Arthur Wesley Dow (1857 – 1922) was an American painter, printmaker, photographer, and influential arts educator.

 

Dow taught at major American arts training institutions for 30 years, among them Teachers College, Columbia University; the Art Students League of New York; Pratt Institute; and his own Ipswich Summer School of Art. His ideas were quite revolutionary for the period, he taught that rather than copying nature, art should be created by elements of the composition, like line, mass and color. His ideas were published in the 1899 book Composition: A Series of Exercises in Art Structure for the Use of Students and Teachers. He taught many of America's leading artists and craftspeople, including Georgia O’Keeffe, Charles Sheeler, Charles J. Martin, two of the Overbeck Sisters and the Byrdcliffe Colony.