When Albert Pinkham Ryder died at the age of seventy, ARTnews noted his passing with the observation, "Ryder was considered by the cognoscenti as one of the ablest and strongest of modern American painters." While to some degree the pastoral scenes of his early career reflected the traditions of both European and American painting, Ryder's art became increasingly original in both style and content as he matured. His subject matter grew to embrace literary, religious, and imaginative themes that he distilled in evocative paintings informed by a deeply personal vision. Ryder's radical simplification of form and space resonated with a younger generation of avant-garde artists, who acknowledged him as a prophet of modernism by including ten of his paintings in the Armory Show of 1913. Alice Boughton photographed Ryder in 1905 at the suggestion of artist Arthur B. Davies, who was later one of the Armory Show's organizers

Alice Boughton (1865-1943)
Gelatin silver print, 1905
Published March 31, 1917
National Portrait Gallery
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

Portrait of the Art World: A Century of ARTnews Photographs
National Portrait Gallery/Smithsonian Institution

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