Image assets for this folder have not been fully processed.
We apologize for any inconvenience.
Eliot Candee Clark (1883-1980) was a landscape painter, writer, and art historian who worked primarily in Virginia.
Eliot Clark was born in 1883 in New York City to artist Walter Clark and Jennie Woodruff Clark. As a child with his father's encouragement and guidance, Eliot Clark began exhibiting as early as the age of nine. submitted works to be exhibited at various New York City clubs as a child. By 1896, at the age of thirteen, he began exhibiting regularly at the National Academy of Design. In 1900, at the age of seventeen, Clark exhibited at the Society of American Artists' Annaul. At one point he even shared a studio with his father. From 1904 to 1906, he traveled throughout Europe and painted en plein air. Clark returned to the New York City area and summered in Kent, Connecticut where he continued to paint and exhibit his work. His first one-man show was at Doll & Richards Gallery in New York City.
Eliot Clark was also an art historian, critic, and educator. In 1916 Clark published his first monograph on Alexander H. Wyant. His other works included a book on John Henry Twachtman, published in 1924 and History of the National Academy of Design (1954). Clark also served as president of the American Watercolor Society between 1920 and 1923. He taught at the Art Students League in New York City but ultimately settled in Charlottesville, Virginia where he taught summer painting classes.
Throughout his life, Clark travelled throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, India, and to Africa. A lengthy trip to India from 1937 to 1938 inspired his study of the religion, mysticism, and art of the country.
Eliot Clark served as president of the National Academy of Design in the 1950s and exhibited until his death in 1980 at the age of ninety-seven. He was survived by his second wife, Margaret Fowler Clark.