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Lucy May Stanton, 1875-1931
Lucy May Stanton was best known for her impressionistic watercolor-on-ivory portrait miniatures. She lived mostly in Georgia, but studied art in Paris around the turn of the century. An advocate for woman's suffrage, Stanton was also well known in the art centers of New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. She presents herself in this large-scale portrait, The Silver Goblet, in a forthright, no-nonsense pose, and displays her virtuosity in handling the watercolor medium. She followed the traditional technique of roughening the surface of the ivory so that pigment would adhere to it, but then tilted her workboard to move the flow of the washes. In "puddling," an innovative wet-in-wet technique, she allowed broad pools of color to shift over the surface and then dry, leaving a rich texture. Stanton also designed this frame, a fine example of the Arts and Crafts style.
Self-portrait, 1912 |