biography of Edward B. GAY (1837-1928)

Birth place: Dublin, Ireland

Addresses: NYC; Mt. Vernon, NY, 1868-1928; Cragsmoor, NY (summers, 1905-on)

Profession: Landscape painter

Studied: James & William Hart and George Boughton, in Albany; Karlsruhe, Germany, with Schirmer, Lessing (1862-64)

Exhibited: Brooklyn AA, 1868-86, 1891; PAFA, 1876, 1890, 1895-98; Am. A. Assn., 1887 (prize); Midwinter Exh., San Fran. (med); New Orleans Expo, 1885 (med); AIC; Pan-Am. Expo, 1901 (medal); SAA, 1903 (prize); St. Louis Expo, 1904 (medal); NAD, 1867-1900, 1905 (gold); Corcoran Gal., 1908.

Member: ANA, 1868; NA, 1907; NYWCC; Art Fund Soc.; Lotos Club

Work: murals, Mt. Vernon Pub. Lib., F. R. Chambers Lib., Bronxville, NY; paintings, Layton Mus., Milwaukee; MMA; Mt. Vernon Pub. Lib.; Minneapolis FA Gal.; NGA; AIC; Montclair AM.

Comments: Gay immigrated from Ireland with his family in 1848, grew up in Albany, NY, and was painting landscapes as early as 1856. In 1881, he financed a European trip with the sale of many of his works. There he was especially influenced by the new approaches to color and light in England and France, while the Norwegian landscape held a special fascination for him. His landscapes are often of views around Mt. Vernon, or at the artists" colony at Cragsmoor, NY.

Sources: G&W; Thieme-Becker; Cowdrey, NAD; Antiques (Nov. 1953), 400; Art Annual, XX; Artists Year Book, 72. More recently, see Gerdts, Art Across America, vol. 1: 155, 168, 175; WW27; Encyclopaedia of New Orleans Artists, 152, which states, that he was possibly in New Orleans in 1866; Pisano, The Long Island Landscape, n.p.; Cragsmoor Artists' Vision of Nature, exh. brochure (Cragsmoor Free Library, NY, 1977); Falk, Exh. Record Series.