Hildegarde Hamilton, Fort Lauderdale, oil on canvas,18 by 14 inches, signed and dated lower right.
Hildegarde Hamilton was born in Syracuse, New York the daughter of a professor at Syracuse University. When her mother died Hildegarde was still a child, in the coming years her father devoted himself to her education in New York, New Jersey, and from 1908 to 1912, in Europe. After her father’s death Hamilton traveled and exhibited widely in this country, in England, France, Italy, and on the steamships as she traveled to Europe. She maintained a studio in the National Arts Club, Gramercy Park, New York City.
Hildegarde Hamilton, Fort Lauderdale, oil canvas 15 by 18 inches. Signed and dated lower right.
In 1937 she bought a home on the Tarpon River in Ft. Lauderdale as a vacation home, using it as her home base for world travels with her two children. Later Ft. Lauderdale became her permanent home. In 1946 Hamilton began spending summers in Nassau in the Bahamas, where she exhibited at the Lucerne Hotel every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon. In the 1950’s Hamilton placed frequent advertisements in the Fort Lauderdale News, opening her home at 100 W. E. 11th Street on Monday and Wednesday from 10 A.M. to 10 P.M. with painting of the Suwannee and Tarpon River for sale.
Hildegarde Hamilton, Fort Lauderdale, oil board, 9.75 by13.5 inches. Signed lower right.
Hildegarde Hamilton, Fort Lauderdale, oil on canvas, 20 by 25 1/8 inches. Sighed and dated 1965, lower right.
In the spring of 1967, she traveled to Rio de Janeiro and then to Argentina. In 1968 she exhibited in Nassau at the Carlton House. Hamilton visited Ecuador in 1969, and in the fall, she went to New York City to exhibit paintings at the Hotel Irving. In January of 1970 she had what was to be her last exhibit at the Pen and Brush Club in New York City. Hamilton was driven back to Ft. Lauderdale, where she died at Broward General Hospital.
Some years back Deborah and Edward Pollack, art dealers with a gallery on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach, purchased some 500 of her paintings, watercolors, and drawings by Hamilton. Some were exhibited as A Tropical Colorist Rediscovered: Paintings of Florida, the Bahamas and Cuba at the Society of the Four Arts library for the January-March 2004 winter season. The Palm Beach Daily News, headlined, “Trailblazer emerges from obscurity, Works by Hildegarde Hamilton, known for her use of sunshine and color.” Perhaps someday the Nova Southeastern University Art Museum in Fort Lauderdale will recognize this lost artist daughter of Fort Lauderdale.
Hildegarde Hamilton, Fort Lauderdale, oil canvas, 14.5 by 17.5 inches. Signed lower right.
Born: September 11, 1898, Syracuse, New York. Died: January 22, 1970, Ft. Lauderdale. Education: Art Students League, NYC; Summer Landscape School, Woodstock, NY; University of Arizona, 1921, BA; 1921 to 1926 in Europe at Academie Julian, Academie Colarossi, Ecole Des Beaux-Arts, Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris, France; Academia de Bellas Artes, Sevilla, Spain (reportedly the first female to graduate); Harvey and Proctor School of Modern Landscape Painting, Newlyn, Cornwall, England; John Herron Art Institute, Indianapolis, Indiana; Cincinnati Art Academy; with Anthony Thieme, Rockport, Massachusetts. Membership: Broward Art Guild’ Bahama Arts Society; Southern States Art League; Washington Art Club; Art Promotors Club, Washington, D.C.; National Arts Club, NYC; Pen and Brush Club, NYC; Boston Art Club; Louisville Art Association. Exhibits: Ainslie Galleries, Fifth Ave. New York, 1927, 1st one woman show; Galerie Bernheim Jejune, Paris, November 1928; First American woman to exhibit, Philip Dillon’s Club, Provence, France, 1929; 40th Salon, Société des Artistes Independents, Paris, 1929; Galerie Alban, Monte Carlo; Society of Modern Artists, Paris, 1929; Y.W.C.A., Plainfield, New Jersey, December 1929, European scenes; Carlton Hotel, Washington, D.C. 1930; Grand Central Galleries, NYC; Anderson Galleries, NYC, 1930; National Art Club, NYC, 1932; Pen and Brush Club, NYC 1935, 1937; University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, sponsored by University of Georgia art department, March 1937, 25 paintings; Vendome Art Gallery, 339 West 57th Street, New York City, 1940, New York Public Library, 1940; Nassau, Bahama, summers at Lucerne Hotel; Ogunquit Art Center, Maine, 1944; Society of Independent Artists, 1944; Barbizon Art Gallery, 1945; Burdine’s, Fort Lauderdale, window exhibit, April 1949, Patio in Havana, Castle in Budapest, Hibiscus at Night, Inland Coastal Waterway; American Artist Professional League, Outdoor Exhibit at Fort Lauderdale City Hall, November 1952; National Art Club, NYC, 1955; Pen and Brush Club, NYC, 1970; Society of the Four Arts Library, A Tropical Colorist Rediscovered: Paintings of Florida, the Bahamas and Cuba, January-March, 2003, painting from Deborah and Edward Pollack; Vendome Gallery; Syracuse Museum; University of Kentucky; University of Georgia. Work: Wesleyan College, Georgia; Evergreen School, Plainfield, N.J.; Virginia Military Institute; Darwin House, London, England; American Church of Paris; University of Georgia. Directory: Listed in the Ft. Lauderdale City Directory in 1954, 1959 as an artist with studio at 100 SE 11th.
