Bolton Brown

Bolton Coit Brown (November 27, 1864 September

15, 1936)[1] was an American painter, lithographer, and
mountaineer. He was one of the original founders of the
Byrdclie Colony in Woodstock, NY, part of what is now
referred to as the Woodstock Art Colony.

Bolton Brown, Sketch of Mount King, 1896.

Bolton Brown, Moonlight Bathers, 1915. Lithograph.

2 Byrdclie
1

Before Woodstock: Stanford and

the Sierras

Browns skills as an artist and outdoorsman brought him

to the attention of Ralph Radclie Whitehead (1854
1929), an aristocratic utopian who developed the concept, and supplied the capital, for the Byrdclie Colony.
Byrdclie was an artists colony based on ideals and models provided by John Ruskin (18191900) and the English
Arts and Crafts movement. Brown convinced Whitehead
that Woodstock, NY, in the heart of the Catskill Mountains, was where Byrdclie should be, although Whitehead had planned on a location further south.[7] Along
with fellow artistic spirit Hervey White, also hired by
Whitehead, Brown developed and managed the grounds
of Byrdclie from 19021903. But Brown and White
were both, ultimately, unable to sustain working relationships with Whitehead. White left of his own accord;
Brown, meanwhile, was red.[8]

Brown was born and raised in Dresden, in upstate New

York. After receiving his Masters in Painting from
Syracuse University,[2]:1617 he moved to California in
1891 to create the Art Department at Stanford University. Brown headed the department for almost ten years,
but was dismissed in a dispute over his use of nude models in the classroom.[2]:4447
Brown was an accomplished mountain climber and beneted from Stanfords proximity to the Sierra Nevada
range, mostly famously explored by Sierra Club founder
John Muir (18381914). Brown was the rst to record
climbing a group of peaks in the Sierras with, in two
instances, his intrepid wife Lucy; his most challenging
rst ascent was of Mount Clarence King (also known as
Mount King[3] ) in August 1896.[4][5] According to the
Climbers Guide to the High Sierra, Browns ascent of
Mount King was the rst time advanced aid-climbing
techniques were used in North America.[6]:247 Nearby
Mount Bolton Brown (13,538 ft) is named after him;
Brown also named several peaks in the area of Mount
King.[5]

3 Painter-printmaker
Bolton Brown went on to create experimental landscape
paintings, migrating between Woodstock and New York
City and working within the style that came to be known
as Tonalism. He exhibited one painting at the leg1

EXTERNAL LINKS

endary 1913 Armory Show in New York but, despite [9] George Wesley Bellows Original Lithographs & Drawings. www.georgebellows.com. 2011. Retrieved 2011skill and dedication, never succeeded as a painter. In
12-24.
1915, he turned to lithography, a print-making technique
that would ultimately occupy his time and intellect to [10] Netsky, Ronald (2003). Bolton Brown: Artist, Teacher,
an almost obsessive degree. Brown earned his greatPrinter. Bolton Coit Brown: A Retrospective. New Paltz:
est fame printing lithographs for well-known Woodstock
Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, SUNY. p. 30.
artist George Bellows,[9] whose premature death in 1925
was both a professional and emotional blow to Brown. [11] John Taylor Arms Papers, Bryn Mawr College Library
Special Collections.
In addition to printing for Bellows, Rockwell Kent, John
Sloan, George William Eggers and others, Brown created over 400 lithographs of his own,[10] with a focus on
nature and female nudes; lithographs such as Moonlight 6 External links
Bathers (1915), Cloudy Dawn, (1916) and Sifting Shadows (1916) represent Browns ability to translate Tonal Bolton Brown at The British Museum
ism from painting into a print medium.[10]
Biography of Bolton Brown, Fletcher Gallery

Death

Brown died in 1936 in Woodstock, alone and impoverished but by no means unaccomplished. Thinking
and working ceaselessly until the end, he left behind an
enormous output of lithographs and writings, including
books and articles on painting and lithography and 12 volumes of journals documenting his experiments in printmaking.[11]

References

[1] Wisbey, Herbert A., Jr. (November 1995). Bolton

Brown: Dresdens Other Famous Son. Crooked Lake Review.
[2] Adams, Clinton (1993). Crayonstone: The Life and Work
of Bolton Brown. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
[3] Mount Clarence King. Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey. Retrieved
2008-12-29.
[4] Brown, Bolton (1897). Wanderings in the High Sierra,
Between Mt. King and Mt. Williamson, Part 2. Sierra
Club Bulletin 2 (2): 9596.
[5] Cheryl Angelina Koehler (March 2007). Touring the
Sierra Nevada. University of Nevada Press. p. 198. ISBN
978-0-87417-700-8. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
[6] Roper, Steve (1976). The Climbers Guide to the High
Sierra. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books.
[7] Bolton Brown, Early Days at Woodstock, published
posthumously in 1937, reprinted in Bolton Coit Brown: A
Retrospective, exh. cat. (New Paltz: Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, SUNY, 2003), p. 73
[8] Tanyol, Derin (Summer 2012). "'Stone, The Most Perfect
of Surfaces: Bolton Brown in the Sierra and Woodstock.
Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide 11 (2).

Byrdclie Art Colony History

Exploration of the Sierra Nevada
Sierra Club Bulletins 18931896

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

7.1

Text

Bolton Brown Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolton_Brown?oldid=667862414 Contributors: Hike395, PFHLai, Bender235,

Lockley, Bgwhite, Jayen466, Nyttend, Gamsbart, Citation bot, The Interior, MCVMCVMCV, RjwilmsiBot, VernoWhitney, DASHBot,
ArticlesForCreationBot, Pastrychick, Smitkai147, KasparBot and Anonymous: 1

7.2

Images

File:Moonlight_Bathers_by_Bolton_Brown.jpg Source:
Bolton_Brown.jpg License: Fair use Contributors:
Woodstock Artists Association and Museum (WAAM)
Original artist: ?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a4/Moonlight_Bathers_by_

File:Sketch_of_Mount_King_by_Bolton_Brown.jpg Source:
King_by_Bolton_Brown.jpg License: PD-US Contributors:
published in the Sierra Club Bulletin
Original artist:
Bolton Brown

7.3

Content license

Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c5/Sketch_of_Mount_