Richard H. Bassett
| Richard Horace Bassett | |
|---|---|
| Born | February 21, 1900 Durham, North Carolina |
| Died | February 6, 1995 (aged 94) Milton, Massachusetts |
| Education | Phillips Academy |
| Alma mater | Harvard College |
| Occupation | Impressionist painter |
| Spouse(s) | Henrietta Durant Claire Birge (m. 1966; her death 1990) Eleanor Scott (m. 1992; his death 1995) |
| Children | Edward Bassett |
| Parent(s) |
John Spencer Bassett Jessie Lewellin |
Richard Horace Bassett (February 21, 1900 – February 6, 1995) was an American impressionist and was the founder and head of the Milton Academy Art Department in Milton, Massachusetts from 1945 to 1965. He studied extensively in Europe and in the United States and had several one man and group shows in prominent galleries in New York and Boston including the Grace Horne Gallery on Newbury Street and Ferargil Galleries in New York. His career spanned over 80 years and in addition to the art he produced he is also noted for his contributions to the methodology of teaching art in school systems.
Richard H. Bassett was born February 21, 1900 on the campus of Trinity College, now known as Duke University, in Durham, North Carolina. He was the son of the prominent historian John Spencer Bassett (1867–1928) and Jessie Lewellin (1866–1950). His only sibling was Margaret Byrd Bassett (1902–1982), an author.
In 1906, the family moved to Northampton, Massachusetts, after John Spencer Bassett published a controversial article supporting equal rights of African Americans and was forced by pressure from politicians to resign his position. Northampton remained as a base for Richard Bassett until the family home was sold in 1959. Bassett attended the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.
In the Spring of 1911, Bassett moved with his mother, Jessie Lewellin Bassett, to Vevey, Switzerland where he was enrolled in private school and began studies with the Swiss painter, Henri Edouard Bercher, a graduate of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Geneva and a frequent exhibitor of landscapes at the Suisse Salon des Beaux-Arts. In 1912, they moved to Paris where Bassett, a twelve-year-old, impressed the British painter Percyval Tudor-Hart with the fact that he had already learned to draw better than many of Tudor-Hart’s much older students. Bassett, therefore, was invited to enter the academy at 69 Rue d’Assas in Montparnasse. Among Tudor-Hart’s other students were New Zealand-born Owen Merton and the Englishman James Wood.
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