Biografie von William Edward NORTON (1843-1916)

Birth place: Boston, MA

Death place: NYC

Addresses: Boston, until early 1870s; London, England, c.1875-1901; NYC, c.1901-on

Profession: Marine painter

Studied: Lowell Inst., Boston; G. Inness; in Paris with Chevreuse and A. Vollon, early 1870s

Exhibited: NAD, 1868, 1895; Boston (golds); Boston AC, 1873-1909; PAFA Ann., 1888, 1895, 1904; Paris Salon, 1895-98; CAFA, 1905 (prize), 1914 (prize); Royal Acad., London, 1878-1901; Columbian Expo, Chicago, 1893, AIC; Corcoran Gal annual, 1907

Member: BAC; CAFA; SC, 1904; Blackheath AC, London.

Work: BMFA; NMAA; Portland (ME) Hist. Soc.; Essex Hall, Salem, MA

Comments: As a young man, Norton sailed on family-owned ships and discovered his love of marine subjects. After establishing his first studio in Boston, he studied in Paris. He and his wife then settled in London where he exhibited throughout the last quarter of the 19th-century, earning a strong reputation for his ocean, coastal, and Thames River scenes. Around 1901, he returned to the U.S., settling in NYC. He also painted at Monhegan Island, ME, where a dangerous ledge off the Southern shore of the island is named "Norton's Ledge" after this well-known sailor-artist.

Sources: WW15; Curtis, Curtis, and Lieberman, 133, 185; Fink, American Art at the Nineteenth-Century Paris Salons, 376; 300 Years of American Art, vol. 1, 398; Falk, Exh. Record Series.

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