The Rensselaer County Historical Society (RCHS) is presenting an exhibit, “At the Foot of the Hills: The Landscapes of Arthur Gibbes Burton.” The exhibit of over 30 paintings by Impressionist artist Arthur Gibbes Burton (1883-1969) opened on Thursday, August 8, and runs through September 28, 2013. An opening celebration will be held on Tuesday, August 13, at 5:30 pm during RCHS’s Deck Party. Tickets cost $20.
The landscapes, most of Vermont’s West River Valley where Burton spent much of his adult life, are organized by season and display Burton’s bright color palette and broad brush strokes. An additional section displays non-landscape painting, revealing Burton’s range as an artist.
Arthur Gibbes Burton was born in 1883 in West Troy (now Watervliet) and spent his childhood in Hoosick Falls, graduating high school there in 1901. His uncle and aunt, Jacob and Clara Groesbeck, financed his education at the prestigious Pratt Institute in Brooklyn where he graduated with degrees in fine art and mechanical drawing in 1909. Burton later recalled how the picturesque rural scenery of his youth would greatly influence the direction his artistic career would take.
He painted camouflage for the World War I military effort and taught in New York City public schools where he met another teacher, Mary Doherty, whom he married in 1915. Following a brief stint as a commercial artist for McGraw-Hill he maintained a seasonal studio in Brewster, NY, for a few years. In 1927, the Burtons moved to Newfane, VT, where he fell in love with the scenery of the West River valley.
Burton’s mentor at Pratt was the renowned Impressionist artist, John Carlson. Burton attended Carlson’s landscape school at the fledgling Byrdcliffe art colony in Woodstock, NY, sponsored by the Art Students League. In Vermont, Burton met other Impressionist landscape artists such as Aldro T. Hibbard and Robert Emmett Owen.
Following his death in 1969 his remaining paintings, drawings and lithographs, as well as archival materials remained hidden until 1988 when the Garden Café and Gallery in Londonderry, VT, exhibited and sold them for the owners.
Warren Broderick of Lansingburgh, the exhibition organizer, has been researching Burton for the last few years. He discovered that the vast majority of Burton’s work remains in the private collections of the families who knew the artist. Very little has ever been published about Burton so information on the artist has come mainly from personal recollections and from original source documents.
For details contact RCHS at 518-272-7232 or visit online at www.rchsonline.org.