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Our Artist Abroad. The Paris (France) Morning News of April 18th containted the following in relation to the artist daughter of John Cheritree of Oak Hill, this county‘: ‘A few years ago, When quite a young lady, Miss Olive E. Cheritree went with some friends to pass the Summer season in the Catskills. One day when strolling along the classic spot where drunken Rip used to laze about, and wondering, may be, why it is that modern wives are too often the scolding Xeantippes that Fran Van Winkle seems to have been, she came upon Mr. James Hart, busy at work sketching some of that scenery which can be found nowhere else so lovely as it is on both sides of the Hudson. The acquaintance thus formed was a lasting one, and on their return to Gotham Miss Cherotree began to take les sons from the famous painter. She began with flowers, but her mind was in quite an other direction. Then she went into the Ad irondacks and also to the White Mountains in company with Mrs. Beer, an artist teacher who used to conduct budding geniuses through Conway Meadows and other New Hampshire places, where all sorts of landscapes are 80 nice and numerous. Later on she opened her studio in New York, and painted canvases that her admiring friends pronounced veritable chefs douvre. She knew better than this her self, paid little attention to such extravagant praise, and determined to visit Europe and study art in a proper school. To this her worshipers urged every objection, that she was firm in her decision, and eventually came abroad, with a sort of an idea, however, that she could learn all that was required in about six months—perhaps in even less time. “That was five years ago, and Miss Olive Cherotree has discovered that although she has studied hard all this time, there is a lot left to learn, and she is still trying to learn it. She first traveled through Scotland ; then she went to Germany, next to Switzerland, and finally to Paris. It was at The Hague where she was seized with the idea of painting ani mals. Not long afterward she had made a first-rate copy of Rosa Bonheur’s famous pic ture in the Luxembourg. One day, when at work copying in the Louvre, Mr. Harry Thomp son, the celebrated English painter, noticed her at work, and he told her that she was not doing it in the proper way. She was brave enough to confess that she knew it, and thanked him for the excellent lesson that he gave her then and there. She entered his studio as a pupil, studied with him for a year and then went into Van Marck’s atelier. Here she made acquaintance with Matilda Lotz and Elizabeth Strong, two artists whom I have al ready described in these sketches, and these three American girls are now numbered among the younger generation of animal painters who have remarkably strong talent, and the intel ligence necessary to use it to good advantage. ‘Miss Cherotree first exhibited in 1882 a study which is nowowned in Buffalo. She missed the next year , but in 1884 her ‘ Avant Y'Orage,’ a scene in Normandy, was remarked by many visitors to the Salon. She has two pictures in Boston at the present time; one of them is to be exhibited at the American Art Association Exhibition, and the other goes to Chicago. For awhile back she has been occu pying a studio ever so far out yonder in the Passage des Favorites, a place and quarter where sculptors thrive apace, and where each inhabitant has a garden and house in which to live, and a massive front gate, to which the worst clanging bell that ever disturbed the air is invariably attached. But she will not re main out there long; indeed, I may say she has already left it to enter Carolus Durand’s atelier, where she will study figure-drawing until it is time for her to seek the country and her cattle again. ‘*Tast Bummer Miss Cherotree passed her time with Misa Strong at Senlis. The Duchess de Luynes, who lives in the Chateau of Dam- Pierres hard by, used to send one of her farm hands with several head of cattle for the latter to sketch for her Salon picture of this year. It is a scene of meadow life in Normandy. There are old trees, undulating fields, cows and a gray horse. In the middle distance two women are seated on the ground ; it is a noon day effect, and the sky is very gray, with a touch of blue to give it proper tone. Some water in the left foreground reflects trees and and animals, and the effect of the whole is really excellent. ¢I am studying how to work in clay and wax now,’ says Misa Cheritree. Just as I am about to leave. *I make models of horses, of their feet, legs, all parts of their body, 80 am to be able to know the anatomy of the noble animal in every detail.’ She adds this in a tone in which there is a good deal less of pride than there is of that ambitious industry which overcomes obstacles and enables women as well as men to arrive at an excellence that not infrequently becomes abzolnie’ grastness.”
Newspaper Details
Margaretville Catskill Recorder
Margaretville, New York, US
Fri, May 15, 1885
Page 3
Full Page
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FL, USA 01 Feb 2026
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