Walter Russell
| Walter Russell | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
May 19, 1871 Boston, Massachusetts |
| Died | May 19, 1963, age 92 Waynesboro, Virginia |
| Occupation | Artist, philosopher, builder, musician |
Walter Bowman Russell (May 19, 1871 – May 19, 1963) left a legacy that centers around his unique Cosmogony, or concept of the universe, having spent many years writing about the nature of humankind's relationship to the Universal One and the degrees of consciousness.
He was an American painter (of the Boston School), sculptor, natural philosopher, musician, author, and builder. His books and lectures place him firmly in the New Thought Movement. The New York Herald Tribune, called him "the modern Leonardo". a Renaissance man for the twentieth century. Although considered by some a polymath, Russell was not an academician.
Born in Boston on May 19, 1871, to Nova Scotian immigrants, Russell left school at age 9 1/2 and went to work, then put himself through the Massachusetts Normal Art School. He interrupted his fourth year to spend three months in Paris at the Academie Julian. Biographer Glenn Clark identifies four instructors who prepared him for an art career: Albert Munsell and Ernest Major in Boston, Howard Pyle in Philadelphia, and Jean-Paul Laurens in Paris.
In his youth, Russell earned money as a church organist and by leading small orchestras. His compositions, mostly waltzes, were acknowledged by Ignace Paderewski in Boston in 1891 or 1892, and on a later occasion by him in New York.
"Mr. Russell eventually turned himself into one of the most self-made Americans since Benjamin Franklin."
Before he left Boston in 1894, Russell married Helen Andrews (1874-1953) and traveled to Paris for their wedding trip and a second term for him at the Academie Julian.
After their wedding trip, Russell and his wife settled in New York in 1894 and had two daughters. Russell's rise in New York was immediate; a reporter wrote in 1908, "Mr. Russell came here from Boston and at once became a great artistic success."
Walter Russell's careers as an illustrator, correspondent in the Spanish–American War, child portrait painter and builder are detailed in several questionnaires he answered and submitted to Who's Who in America.
He attracted widespread attention with his allegorical painting "The Might of Ages" in 1900. The painting represented the United States at the Turin international exhibition and won several awards.
By 1903, Russell had published three children's books (The Sea Children, The Bending of the Twig, and The Age of Innocence) and qualified for the Authors Club, which he joined in 1902.
Russell made his mark as a builder, creating $30 million worth of top-quality cooperative apartments. He is credited with developing "cooperative ownership into an economically sound and workable principle." The Hotel des Artistes on West 67th Street in Manhattan is considered his masterpiece. Designed by the architect George Mort Pollard, the building has been home to many of the famed and illustrious, including Noel Coward, Isadora Duncan, writer Fannie Hurst, New York City Mayor John V. Lindsay, Alexander Woollcott, and Norman Rockwell.
...
Wikipedia