Portrait of a Man and Woman in a Flower Dress: A Pair of Portraits

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Durr Freedley
Portrait of a Man and Woman in a Flower Dress: A Pair of Portraits
c. 1930

Name: Portrait of a Man and Woman in a Flower Dress: A Pair of Portraits
Brand: Durr Freedley
Price: 24000 USD

About the Item

Durr Freedley enjoyed a rich and varied career that took him from his native Indiana to New York City, where he was a respected decorative arts curator at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Responding to his own creative impulse, he later became a painter, honing his skills in Italy and France before finally settling in Newport, Rhode Island. He went on to become a well-known figure in local art life, garnering recognition as both a portraitist and muralist. Largely forgotten after his death, Freedley’s considerable accomplishments were recently the subject of an exhibition held at the Newport Art Museum. (See Nancy Whipple Grinnell, Reviving Durr Freedley: Newport’s Forgotten Artist, exhib. cat. [Newport, Rhode Island: Newport Art Museum, 2015].) Born Jesse Jacob Friedley in Indianapolis, Indiana, on June 21, 1888, Durr Freedley was the son of Harmon Henry Friedley, a lawyer and insurance executive, and his wife, Sybil. (While residing in Italy during World War I, the artist changed the spelling of his surname to Freedley. Grinnell notes [p. 10] that the original of his first name, “Durr,” remains a mystery.) Following his graduation from Short Ridge High School in Indianapolis, he attended Williams College from 1906 to 1908. Freedley then went to London, studying at the Royal College of Art during 1908–09. His professors there included William Lethaby, an architectural historian who emphasized the precepts of the English Arts and Crafts Movement in his classes on design and ornament, and through this means stimulated Freedley’s interest in medievalism and the tradition of fine craftsmanship. After completing his training abroad, Freedley enrolled in the fine arts program at Harvard University, receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1911. During his years in Cambridge, he served as editor of the Harvard Lampoon and befriended Denman Ross, a prominent collector and teacher of formalist design and color theory whose ideas inspired many American artists. In the summer of 1911, Freedley traveled to Italy with Harold Pulsifer, a fellow Harvard graduate who later became a poet and magazine editor. Upon returning to the United States in the autumn of 1911, Freedley joined the Department of Decorative Arts at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. He initially worked as an assistant to Wilhelm R. Valentiner, Curator of the Department of Decorative Arts, and was later promoted to Assistant Curator and then Acting Curator. (Details relative to Freedley’s tenure at the museum can be found in the Durr Friedley Records, 1906–1918, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Archives.) In an autobiographical account Freedley wrote for his former Harvard classmates in 1921, he described his time at the museum as “exciting,” noting that “The Pierpont Morgan, Altman, and other collections of works of art were received during this period . . . [and] a considerable portion of these collections were under my charge” (“Durr Freedley,” in Harvard College, Class of 1911: Decennial Report, June 1921 [Cambridge, Massachusetts: privately printed, 1921], p. 154). Indeed, in his various capacities as a curator, Freedley was responsible for the purchase and exhibition of decorative art objects and acted as a liaison with leading dealers and collectors, especially in relation to early colonial furnishings acquired for the American Wing. A regular contributor to the museum’s monthly Bulletin, he also wrote informative articles on diverse topics pertaining to the permanent collection, ranging from Korean pottery and seventeenth-century wood carvings to Mohammedan manuscripts and Flemish decorative art. Freedley was likewise involved in a number of freelance projects, including creating designs for an embroidered Easter altar set for New York’s Trinity Church and designing altar ornaments for the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament in St. John the Evangelist Church in Newport. In 1917, Freedley was offered the post of Curator at The Metropolitan Museum, but he declined the position and resigned. In December of that year, he enlisted in the U.S. Army and served as a camouflage officer in the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps. After being discharged in July 1919, he decided, as he put it, to become “a painter with a strong inclination towards portraits” (ibid.). In 1923, after spending some time painting in the Rocky Mountains and California, Freedley relocated to Paris. Establishing his studio on the boulevard Raspail on the Left Bank, he painted likenesses of stylish European aristocrats and American society types, working in a heightened realist style inspired by the aesthetics of Art Deco, Asian art, and frescoes from the proto-Renaissance period. While living abroad, he also made occasional trips back to the United States, where he undertook portrait commissions. In 1927, the year he rented an apartment in New York, Freedley painted portraits of the aforementioned Ross and the American architectural critic Mariana Griswold van Rensselaer. (Both portraits are in the collection of the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts.) Freedley was based in France until 1932, when he relocated to Newport, where he had been commissioned to execute murals for the Memorial Chapel of the Seaman’s Church Institute. A member of the Harvard Club of New York and the Coffee House, also in New York, Freedley exhibited his work at regional venues such as the Providence Art Club and the Society of Arts and Crafts in Boston. He was also affiliated with the Newport Association, where he became friendly with John Howard Benson (1901–1956), a leading American stonecutter, calligrapher, teacher, and medievalist in whom Freedley found a kindred spirit. In 1936, while serving as chairman of exhibitions of Rhode Island’s Tercentenary Committee, Freedley and Benson collaborated on a limited-edition artist’s book, Flags of the Old State House, Newport, RI, which featured wood engravings by Benson after drawings by Freedley. Sadly, Freedley’s career was cut short two years later when he died from injuries suffered in a car accident in Lexington, Massachusetts. Aside from establishing “The Freedley Fund” for two art scholarships, he left the remainder of his estate to Benson and to the architect Howard Moise, a former classmate from Harvard. In the wake of his death, Freedley was honored with memorial exhibitions at the John Herron Art Institute (now the Indianapolis Museum of Art); the Fogg Art Museum; the Art Association of Newport; and the Walker Art Galleries in New York.

Creator:
Durr Freedley (1880 - 1938)
Creation Year:
c. 1930
Dimensions:
Height: 28.5 in (72.39 cm)Width: 23 in (58.42 cm)
Medium:
Oil
Movement & Style:
American Modern
Period:
Early 20th Century
Condition:
Gallery Location:
New York, NY
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU238932062