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Alexander Robertson James (1890-1946) was a painter who worked primarily in Dublin, New Hampshire.
James was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts as Francis Temple Tweedy James to philosopher William James and was the nephew of noted writer Henry James. He studied at the Boston Museum School under Frank W. Benson, before marrying Frederika Paine in 1916 and moving to California. While in California James was met with many portrait commissions, however after two years he moved to Dublin, New Hampshire under the suggestion of his mentor Abbot Thayer in 1918. In 1925 he had his name officially changed to Alexander Robertson James. Later in life he dropped the Robertson and became Alexander James.
During the depression, the family moved to Paris, France in 1929 before moving again to the suburb of Ville d'Avrey. In 1930, the family returned to Dublin and in 1931 James took a reprieve of one year to live in Richmond, New Hampshire to paint portraits. From 1930 to 1937, James focused on portrait painting and his most famous works include George de Forest Brush and Portrait of a Professor. James remained in Richmond, where his wife and three children visited on weekends, until returning to Dublin in 1942. In the last years of his life, he built a studio behind his Dublin home which was completed in 1945. James would die soon after.
James is also well known for his impressionist inspired landscapes and genre scenes and was a long time exhibitor at the Art Institute of Chicago as well as the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Corcoran Gallery of Art. He was a member of the Century Association and today his works can be seen at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Springfield Museum of Fine Arts, and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Fine Art in Missouri.
Alexander Robertson James died of a heart attack on February 26, 1946.