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Prentiss Taylor

Prentiss Taylor, artist, teacher and lecturer, who was born in 1907 at Washington, D.C., continues to be a resident of the Greater Capitol area, residing in nearby Arlington, Virginia.

Mr. Taylor was educated in the D.C. public schools and at Sidwell's Friends' School in Washington. He graduated from McKinley (Tech) High School. At McKinley High, he studied art under Mary P. Shipman and Alexis Many. At National School of Art he [[strikethrough]] was [[/strikethrough]] studied under Inez Hogan, the well known author-illustrator of children's books. Mr. Taylor worked from the antique and in composition at Corcoran Gallery Art School. He also studied painting under Charles W. Hawthorne at Provincetown, Mass. and Anne Goldthwaite, Charles Locke and Eugene Fitsch at the Art Students League, New York City.

Mr. Taylor worked in stage design in New York City, from 1926-1930. He was a Fellow at the MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, New Hampshire, 1928-29-30-32 and was at Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, New York 1929.

Artist Taylor's first one-man show was at the invitation of the late Eben Comins, at the Arts Club of Washington in 1927. Other one-man shows were at the Gibbes Gallery, Charleston, S.C.; Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences, Norfolk, Virginia; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, Virginia; Mint Museum, Charlotte, North Carolina; Macbeth Gallery, Rehn Gallery, New York City; Grace Horne Gallery, Boston; Baltimore Museum of Art; Howard University, George Washington University, Studio House, Whyte Gallery, Corcoran Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Public Library, Wilson Teachers College, Washington, D.C.; Print Club of Philadelphia; Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida; Farnsworth Museum, Rockland, Maine; Mattatuck Society, Waterbury, Connecticut; University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia; and Averett College, Danville, Virgina.

Mr. Taylor was represented in Whitney Museum annual exhibition of prints, water colors and paintings; in "Painting in the United States, 1946-1947, 1948 and 1949" at Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh; American Water Color, Drawing and Print National Exhibition, Metropolitan Museum; National Exhibitions of Prints, Library of Congress; Chicago Art Institute water color and print international exhibitions; Corcoran Biennial in 1949 and 1951 and in other national exhibitions.

Lithographs by Prentiss Taylor's [[strikethrough]] work [[/strikethrough]] are in the collections of: Library of Congress, Phillips Collection, Smithsonian Institution, Boston Museum of Arts, University of Maine, University of Delaware, Yale University, Baltimore Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum, Whitney Museum, Museum of Modern Art, Gibbes Gallery, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Wadsworth Atheneum, Addison Gallery of American Art, New York Public Library, Metropolitan Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Boston Public Library, Lessing Rosenwald Collection and others.

Water colors by Prentiss Taylor are in the collections of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (purchase award 1943) and the Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences.

The Prentiss Taylor painting "Le Parapluie de ma Tante", was purchased by the Corcoran Gallery of Art in 1951. Other works by Prentiss Taylor are in the private collections of Katherine Cornell, Carl Van Vechten, the U.S. Ambassador to Norway and Mrs. Strong and Mrs. Anne Archbold.

Mr. Taylor is a [[strikethrough]] member [[/strikethrough]] of the associate National Academy of Design in the graphics class. He belongs to the Society of American Graphics Arts, the Print Club of Albany and the Society of Washington Printmakers. During 1955 and 1957, Mr. Taylor served as President of the Washington Water Color Club and for four terms, between 1943-1950, was President of Artists Guild of Washington.

Among Prentiss Taylor's honors are: 1953, received American Artists Group lithograph prize in Society American Graphic Artists exhibit for "After the Picnic"; 1954, received Cannon graphic prize, National Academy of Design, "Orpheus; the Look Back"; 1943, Pennell Purchase award, 3rd prize class, Library of Congress, "Morelia Aqueduct"; 1943, Virginia Museum water color purchase award, "Turkey in the Straw, Morelia"; 1951, honorable mention and purchase, "Le Parapluie de ma Tante" Corcoran Gallery Area Exhibition; Artist Taylor's lithographs have been included in Exhibits of American Graphic Art for world circulation [[strikethrough]] of American print exhibitions [[/strikethrough]] selected by Carl Zigrosser for Office of War Information and Arthur Heintzelman for Philadelphia Museum and [[strikethrough]] Boston Public Library keepers of prints [[/strikethrough]]; for the State Department and by Alice Lee Parker, Library of Congress for United States Information Service and for Latin-American traveling shows.

[[strikethrough]] During [[/strikethrough]] From 1943-1954, Mr. Taylor was the art-therapist at St. Elizabeths Hospital. He is the author of Art as Psychotherapy, published by the American Journal of Psychiatry, in February 1950. Mr. Taylor is now teaching in Washington, D.C. at The American University and in the Adult Education Department at the Young Women's Christian Association.

Mr. Taylor spoke on Van Gogh and Painting as Personal Expression in the public schools of Washington, Baltimore City, Baltimore County and at the Baltimore Museum of Art, in connection with M-G-M's "Van Gogh Darkness Into Light". This 16 millimeter short subject shows M-G-M's efforts to find the scenes in Holland, Belgium and France of Vincent Van Gogh's life and painting as presented in "Lust for Life". Currently Prentiss Taylor is speaking on the life of Vincent Van Gogh in principle cities of the middle Atlantic states in connection with the showing of M-G-M's "Lust for Life".