John Cuthbert Hare

“Gloucester Harbor”

Circa 1950

John Cuthbert Hare (American, 1908-1978), was an artist and painter primarily known for his watercolor paintings of seascapes, harbor & marine scenes, and boats, but he also did watercolor & oil landscapes, seascapes, cityscapes, village & townscapes, still lifes and European scenes. He was associated with the New England area, especially Cape Cod, Massachusetts where he spent his summers from 1938 to 1965. However, he spent some time in Florida where he was a member of the St. Augustine Art Association, and other locations on the East Coast. Hare was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1908. He first studied commercial art in Brooklyn at the Pratt Institute for three years and also studied at the Art Students League in Manhattan, as well as the Grand Central School of Art in NYC. He worked for Hearst newspapers corporation, and in 1933 married. In the next few years, he and his wife traveled extensively in the United States and abroad in France, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland and England, camping and painting and exhibiting his work in many galleries. In 1935, they visited St. Augustine and an exhibition of his watercolors was held there in the old bank building by the cathedral. In Provincetown, they also exhibited paintings that Hare had completed in Florida. The couple liked St. Augustine so well that they returned two years later, joined the Art Association, and set up a studio at 33 Aviles Street. About 1938, the Hares, attracted to the rolling farmland, moved to Amherst, Massachusetts. He also painted at Gloucester, and from 1967 to 1977, they lived at Yarmouthport, and in 1977, moved to Palm Beach, Florida where he died three years later. His work is in the collections of the Lowe Art Museum and the Lightner Museum in Florida, and the Smith College Museum of Art in Massachusetts.