Norman Mac Leish, Ernest Hemingway House, Key West, watercolor, 12 by 16 inches. Signed and dated lower right, N Mac L 54, titled verso.
Norman Mac Leish, watercolor, signed lower right Mac L 51.
Norman Mac Leish was an annual winter visitor to Florida, first to St. Augustine and later to Naples. During the Depression, Mac Leish worked as director of the Chicago Art Project of the WPA. A winner of the Logan Prize awarded annually by the Art Institute of Chicago, in 1945 Mac Leish moved to St. Augustine, joined the St. Augustine Arts Club, and bought the well-known Octagon House at 62 Lighthouse Avene out on Anastasia Island. In February 1946 he was exhibiting a watercolor Golden Gate Bridge in the Art Club gallery. McLeish wrote a letter to the Editor, St. Augustine Record on Sunday, March 6, 1949, in response to an article in the Saturday Evening Post, he felt was inaccurate. “I am a northerner who visited St. Augustine for the first time in 1945. Three weeks after I arrived, I bought a house here where I have spent a considerable portion of each year. I was not charmed into becoming a resident by any consideration about the authenticity of our points of historic interest. But I was immediately charmed by the friendly character of this little city. In no time it seems to me, I felt that I was part of the life here. I feel that I am missed when I go away, and when I return, I feel that I am coming home. The quaint little streets and the nice old buildings form an unusual and delightful background for the life that goes on in them. One has a feeling that one is among friends in a charming setting.’
In May of 1951Todd Lindenmuth and Mac Leish organized a first St. Augustine Student Art Exhibit. There were over 500 entrants with cash awards donated by Mac Leish. A brief review in the St. Augustine Record, February 7, 1956, notes, “Mr. MacLeish has some rich, somber tones in ‘Laborers’ House, Mexico.’ His Maine paintings show delightful detail peculiar to Maine and in ‘Penobscot Bay’ he gives a most effective view of the mountains and bay, beautifully simplified….” Mac Leish moved to Naples in 1956. He was the brother of famed American poet Archbald MacLeish.
Norman Mac Leish, Four Trees on Anastasia, watercolor, 14.75 by 17.75 inches. Signed and dated lower right, N Mac L 55.
Died: August 19, 1975, Naples, Florida. Education: Williams College; University of Pennsylvania; Art Institute of Chicago; In Europe. Membership: St. Augustine Arts Club; Artists Guild of St. Augustine; Naples Art Association. Exhibits: St. Augustine Arts Club, February 1945, watercolors, Turf Club, Pink House; SAAC, January 1946, Anastasia; SAAC, February 1946, Anastasia Light, Golden Gate Bridge; SAAC, March 1946, Arizona; St. Augustine Art Association, March 1950, honorable mention, Clothes Line; Palette and Brush Gallery, Aviles Street, February 1954; Aviles Gallery, February 1955; SAAA, February 1955, oil, Moonlight on the Shed; Artists Guild of St. Augustine, Ponce de Leon Hotel, January 1956; Brush and Palette Gallery, Aviles Street, February 1956; SAAA, Exchange Bank of St. Augustine, February 1956, Anastasia Inlet through Cedar Trees; Artists’ Guild of St. Augustine, farewell exhibit, January 1957: Naples Woman’s Club, December 9, 1958; Naples Art Association, December 1962, Indian Pool. Directory: Listed in the Naples City Directory in 1960 as an artist with a studio at 2567 Half Moon Walk.
Norman Mac Leish, Salt Run, watercolor 10.5 by 14.5 inches. Signed lower right, N Mac L 55
