Reynolds Beal was an American artist, first an Impressionist

American Impressionism

Impressionism, a style of painting characterized by loose brushwork and vivid colors, was practiced widely among American artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.-An emerging artistic style from Paris:...

, then a Modernist

American modernism

American modernism like modernism in general is a trend of thought that affirms the power of human beings to create, improve, and reshape their environment, with the aid of scientific knowledge, technology and practical experimentation, and is thus in its essence both progressive and optimistic...

, a marine environmentalist, and brother of the New York Alpha Chapter of the Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity at Cornell University

Cornell University

Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

. The elder brother of co-painter Gifford Beal

Gifford Beal

Gifford Beal was an American artist noted for his work as a painter, watercolorist, printmaker and muralist.-Early life:Born in New York City, Gifford Beal was the youngest son in a family of six surviving children...

 was born in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 or the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

. Reyn and his brother Gifford spent their summers at Wilellyn in Newburgh, New York, on the Hudson River

Hudson River

The Hudson is a river that flows from north to south through eastern New York. The highest official source is at Lake Tear of the Clouds, on the slopes of Mount Marcy in the Adirondack Mountains. The river itself officially begins in Henderson Lake in Newcomb, New York...

. Reynolds and Gifford Beal would later design the gardens at Wilellyn. His father was William Reynolds Beal, whose brother Thaddeus owned Echo Lawn, not far away. Beal was a man of independent means, and was thus able to devote his life to his art without having always to appeal to the tastes of his patrons or to contemporary trends. In fact, Beal was thought of as "one of the adventurous experimenters" of his day and was considered "Modernist

American modernism

American modernism like modernism in general is a trend of thought that affirms the power of human beings to create, improve, and reshape their environment, with the aid of scientific knowledge, technology and practical experimentation, and is thus in its essence both progressive and optimistic...

". Today he is recognized as being an important American Impressionist

American Impressionism

Impressionism, a style of painting characterized by loose brushwork and vivid colors, was practiced widely among American artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.-An emerging artistic style from Paris:...

.

Beginnings in maritime engineering

Beal is known as one of the early American Impressionists, and showed artistic ability from an early age. He first studied at Cornell University (naval architecture), where he was a member of the Phi Kappa Psi

Phi Kappa Psi

Phi Kappa Psi is an American collegiate social fraternity founded at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania on February 19, 1852. There are over a hundred chapters and colonies at accredited four year colleges and universities throughout the United States. More than 112,000 men have been...

 Fraternity and the Irving Literary Society

Irving Literary Society (Cornell University)

The Irving Literary Society was a literary society at Cornell University active from 1868 to 1887. The U.S...

. “Reyn” as he was known, painted and sketched in and around Cayuga Lake

Cayuga Lake

Cayuga Lake   is the longest of central New York's glacial Finger Lakes, and is the second largest in surface area and second largest in volume. It is just under 40 miles long. Its average width is 1.7 miles , and it is at its widest point near Aurora...

. His home haunts of the East River

East River

The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...

 were the first subjects of his work; in Sibley Hall’s drafting bays he learned further technique as a budding naval architect. Although the “Sibley time” constitutes his first artistic experience, it was not until the years following graduation that Beal became serious about a painting career.

Painting

Reyn spent 1901 at sea, and worked up his sketchbook entitled Cruising Aboard U.S.S. School Ship St. Mary's (1901), he kept scrapbook pages of marine etchings and photographs, old Christmas cards, personal photographs, exhibition catalogs, and clippings.

From 1900 to 1907, he painted almost exclusively at the artist's community in Noank, Connecticut

Noank, Connecticut

Noank is a village and census-designated place in the town of Groton in New London County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 1,830 at the 2000 census...

 with Henry Ward Ranger

Henry Ward Ranger

Henry Ward Ranger , American artist, was born in western New York State. He became a prominent landscape and marine painter, much of his work being done in the Netherlands, and showing the influence of the modern Dutch school. He became a National Academician , and a member of the American Water...

. After 1912, Beal focused more on the Hudson Valley

Hudson Valley

The Hudson Valley comprises the valley of the Hudson River and its adjacent communities in New York State, United States, from northern Westchester County northward to the cities of Albany and Troy.-History:...

, where he painted the colorful and whimsical scenes of the traveling circuses that came through the region.

Beal adored the beaches in Provincetown

Provincetown, Massachusetts

Provincetown is a New England town located at the extreme tip of Cape Cod in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 3,431 at the 2000 census, with an estimated 2007 population of 3,174...

, Key West

Key West, Florida

Key West is a city in Monroe County, Florida, United States. The city encompasses the island of Key West, the part of Stock Island north of U.S. 1 , Sigsbee Park , Fleming Key , and Sunset Key...

, Rockport

Rockport, Massachusetts

Rockport is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 6,952 at the 2010 census. Rockport is located approximately 25 miles northeast of Boston at the tip of the Cape Ann peninsula...

, Atlantic City

Atlantic City, New Jersey

Atlantic City is a city in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States, and a nationally renowned resort city for gambling, shopping and fine dining. The city also served as the inspiration for the American version of the board game Monopoly. Atlantic City is located on Absecon Island on the coast...

 and Wellfleet

Wellfleet, Massachusetts

Wellfleet is a New England town in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. Located halfway between the "tip" and "elbow" of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, the town had a population of 2,749 at the 2000 census, which swells nearly sixfold during the summer...

, circus scenes and carnival

Carnival

Carnaval is a festive season which occurs immediately before Lent; the main events are usually during February. Carnaval typically involves a public celebration or parade combining some elements of a circus, mask and public street party...

s. Many of his best works convey those themes. Often called "the American Van Gogh", because of his luscious thick avenues of paint, and "the American Chagall" because of his playful subjects, Beal is one of America's finest impressionists. He used a variety of styles including Impressionism and Tonalism

Tonalism

Tonalism was an artistic style that emerged in the 1880s when American artists began to paint landscape forms with an overall tone of colored atmosphere or mist. Between 1880 and 1915, dark, neutral hues such as gray, brown or blue, often dominated compositions by artists associated with the style...

. As he got older, his work became more complex and vibrant with a mosaic of brush strokes. In addition to oils, he was admired as a watercolorist, and he and Gifford made Rockport, Massachusetts their home. At one time, he resided in Gloucester, Massachusetts

Gloucester, Massachusetts

Gloucester is a city on Cape Ann in Essex County, Massachusetts, in the United States. It is part of Massachusetts' North Shore. The population was 28,789 at the 2010 U.S. Census...

, as well. His studio overlooked Rockport's Inner Harbor, from where he drew and etched many harbor scenes.

Critic’s review

One curator summarized his life of excellence in a note tagged to his Eddyville paintings:

Reynolds Beal helped drive American impressionism as the 20th century got underway. Like Lever and Lawson, he favored the Fauvistic

Fauvism

Fauvism is the style of les Fauves , a short-lived and loose group of early twentieth-century Modern artists whose works emphasized painterly qualities and strong colour over the representational or realistic values retained by Impressionism...

 direction, with its strong link to the radical childlike innocence of the American land.

Beal was active in the art community. By 1934, Reyn was an active participant in the Salmagundi Club

Salmagundi Club

The Salmagundi Club, also known as the Salmagundi Art Club, was founded in 1871 in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, New York, in the United States. It currently is located at 47 Fifth Avenue...

, Lotus Club, Century Club

Century Club

Century Club may refer to:*Centurion, a variation of the drinking game known as Power Hour*The Century Association, a prominent private authors and artists club, with its own building, in New York City...

, National Academy of Design

National Academy of Design

The National Academy Museum and School of Fine Arts, founded in New York City as the National Academy of Design – known simply as the "National Academy" – is an honorary association of American artists founded in 1825 by Samuel F. B. Morse, Asher B. Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E...

 and the American Water Color Society. He was also a member of the Society of American Engravers, the National Arts Council

National Arts Council

National Arts Council is the name of a number of national bodies which oversee government funding of the arts.*Australia Council for the Arts*National Culture Fund of Bulgaria*Canada Council*Cayman National Cultural Foundation*Arts Council England...

, and in 1909 was elected as an Associate Member of the National Academy of Design. His progressive tenets marked him as a "modernist", and he helped found the Society of Independent Artists

Society of Independent Artists

Society of Independent Artists was an association of American artists founded in 1916 and based in New York.Based on the French Société des Artistes Indépendants, the goal of the society was to hold annual exhibitions by avant-garde artists. Exhibitions were to be open to anyone who wanted to...

 and the New Society of Artists, which consisted of fifty of the most important painters of the day, including George Bellows

George Bellows

George Wesley Bellows was an American realist painter, known for his bold depictions of urban life in New York City, becoming, according to the Columbus Museum of Art, "the most acclaimed American artist of his generation".-Youth:Bellows was born and raised in Columbus, Ohio...

, Childe Hassam

Childe Hassam

Frederick Childe Hassam was a prolific American Impressionist painter, noted for his urban and coastal scenes. Along with Mary Cassatt and John Henry Twachtman, Hassam was instrumental in promulgating Impressionism to American collectors, dealers, and museums...

, John Sloan, William Glackens

William Glackens

William James Glackens was an American realist painter.Glackens studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and later moved to New York City, where he co-founded what came to be called the Ashcan School art movement...

 and Maurice Prendergast

Maurice Prendergast

Maurice Brazil Prendergast was an American Post-Impressionist artist who worked in oil, watercolor, and monotype...

.

Summation

His most prolific artistic period falls between the years 1910-1920. Illness prevented Beal from painting in oil as spontaneously as he would have liked, and by 1940 he almost stopped painting, much to the vocal dismay of the art world. Almost all of his work is signed, dated and often inscribed. He adored the beach in Provincetown, Key West, Rockport, Atlantic City and Wellfleet, circus scenes and carnivals and many of his best works convey those themes. Reynolds Beal died in Rockport, Massachusetts, in 1951.

External links

• Reynolds Beal papers, 1874-1939 from the Smithsonian Archives of American Art
  Archives of American Art
  The Archives of American Art is the largest collection of primary resources documenting the history of the visual arts in the United States. More than 16 million items of original material are housed in the Archives' research centers in Washington, D.C...