John E. Thompson
1882 - 1945
John Edward Thompson
was an exceptionally well-trained artist and a visionary Colorado
arts leader. He was born in the Irish section of East Buffalo,
New York, and first studied art with noted illustrator Lucius
Hitchcock at the Art Students League’s branch in that city.
While Thompson was learning to draw, he was also working with
his fists, fighting and winning amateur boxing matches. In fact,
in bag-punching he was ranked among the nation’s best. Offered
contracts to stay in the ring, Thompson turned them down to study
art.
While studying with Hitchcock, Thompson began
earning a living as an illustrator. This paid work plus his ring-money
enabled him to go to New York City. Once there he studied at the
Chase School and with Frank Vincent Dumond at the Art Student's
League.
In 1902, Thompson headed for France. The turn
of the century was an exciting time to be in Europe. Artists were
hungry for fresh ideas, experimenting, searching for new ways
to express their creativity and knowledge. Thompson made the most
of it. He studied with Jean Paul Laurens and other artists at
the Julian Academy and with Edmond Francois Aman-Jean at La Palette.
He haunted the Louvre for drawings by the old masters. He fell
in love with the work of Renoir, Daumier and Toulouse-Lautrec,
all considered artistic rebels at that time, but also soaked in
the diverse influences of classical mosaics and murals, Persian
miniatures, and the Renaissance masters.
Thompson spent a little over a year in Holland
living in Laren, a famous painting village near Amsterdam where
he met Josef Israels and Albert Neuhys. By the time he returned
to Paris, Thompson was ready to fall headlong into the heady currents
sweeping the art world. He began exhibiting his work at both the
traditional Salon Francaise and the more contemporary - and controversial
- Autumn Salon. Thompson visited Gertrude Stein, lived for a while
in George Sands’ home and - when funds ran low - put on boxing
exhibitions. As the avante-garde took on new appeal to him, his
academic training expanded to include the new masters, including
the Impressionists.
In 1905 Thompson met Percival Tudor-Hart, considered
by some to be the greatest color scientist of all time. Thompson
studied with him from 1905 to 1908, and received a solid grounding
in color composition and theory.
An art-world-shaking event occurred in Paris
in 1907. The reclusive Post-Impressionist Paul Cezanne had recently
died and a retrospective of his work brought artists from thoughtout
Europe. Anyone who has seen Cezanne’s works firsthand knows
the power of their presence. Cezanne was a colorist and yet it
was his emphasis on the geometry of nature, the supremacy of visual
design and the use of plastic space that helped transformed a
whole generation of artists. Braque and Picasso were developing
Cubism based on what they learned from Cezanne.
Thompson was transfixed by the Cezanne retrospective.
He returned to the Louvre, reexamining all he found there and
all he had learned from his teachers, and suddenly saw everything
from a new perspective. He could trace Cezanne’s basic geometry
in Oriental, Renaissance and ancient art. Working independently,
Thompson began really developing his own vision, melding the geometric
color-planes of Cezanne with the traditional art he loved.
On a quest of discovery, Thompson traveled
to Spain, England, Germany, Italy and the south of France. Then
came World War I. Thompson idealistically expected the war would
be over in three months and went home to Buffalo to wait out the
storm. Back in the United States, railroad travel brochures depicting
the West caught Thompson’s eye. A railroad agent recommended
Pine, Colorado for its fine quality of mountain light. Thompson
acted promptly on the suggestion. Arriving in Pine, he rented
a cabin and settled down to paint mountain landscapes and wait
out the war. Thompson quickly fell in love with the Colorado air,
light and landscape; he also met his future wife.
The Thompsons returned to Buffalo in 1915 for
an exhibition of his work and a stint of teaching. When Thompson
returned toDenver in 1917, a number of students followed him west,
including Walter Mruk and Jozef Bakos. (These two artists eventually
formed the Santa Fe group Los Cinco Pintores along with B.J.O.
Nordfelt, Willard Nash, and Andrew Dasburg.) Once back in Denver,
Thompson began infusing the area with modern art and artistic
freedom. He mounted a “Colorado Armory Show” in 1918,
undaunted by the negative editorials and hysterical letters to
the editor that invariably followed modern art in the first half
of the 20th century. Thompson began teaching at the Denver Academy
of Applied Art and soon gathered a new group of art disciples,
including Frank Vavra and Charles F. Ramus. Thompson was determined
to bring French and European artistic sensibilities to the rugged
and still-wild west, and soon both Elisabeth Spalding (an artist
and Denver Art Guild luminary) and Anne Evans (a Denver Art Museum
maven) were championing Thompson’s cause.
With the establishment of Chappell House (later
the Denver University art department) and extensive personal exposure
through his mural work, Thompson became established in Denver’s
cultural life and one of its most famous artists. He spent many
summers painting and teaching in Santa Fe, and made important
contributions to that art community as well. For his personal
talents, and his dedication to art and to the community, John
Edward Thompson came to be known as the “Dean of Colorado
Painters.” Said Donald Bear, director of the Santa Barbara
Museum of Art, when Thompson died in 1945, “I have never
in my life met anyone… who knew so profoundly, so thoroughly and
yet so simply and directly what constituted great painting… I
have never met anyone either, that could convey what he knew with
such clarity.”
John Edward Thompson remains one of Colorado’s
best-known and most avidly collected painters.
SELECTED MURALS:
St. Martins Chapel, Denver University Theatre, Denver National
Bank, Polo Club, International Trust Building, Midland Savings,
Symes Building, Fisher and Fisher architectural firm, Casanova
Room at the Brown Palace (all in Denver), Maytag House (Colorado
Springs).
SELECTED AMERICAN
EXHIBITS:
Joslyn Museum (Omaha NE), Art Institute of Chicago, New York World's
Fair, Philadelphia Sesqui-Centennial Exhibition, Grand Palace of the Legion of
Honor (San Francisco), Corcoran Museum (Washington D.C.)
RETROSPECTIVES:
Denver Art Museum, 1945, and Colorado Springs Fine Art Center,
1963.
MEMBERSHIPS AND AWARDS:
Member of “The Atelier,” a Denver group of artists and architects; member
of the Denver Art Guild; member of the Société des Artistes Francais.
Named by fellow artists to the Denver Art Hall of Fame.
SELECTED REFERENCES:
American Art Exhibition.(1st annual) catalog. Rockefeller
Center. New York, 1936.
Bridaham,
D. “Thompson Art Deserves Permanent Denver Display.” The Denver Post
Roundup, January 6, 1963: 10-11
“Colorado Artist's Works on Display.”
The Rocky Mountain News, July 11, 1964: 51
Dawdy, D.O. Artists
of the American West. 3 vols. Chicago: Swallow, 1974: 231
Falk, P.H.
Who was Who in American Art. Madison: Sound View, 1985
Fielding, M.
Dictionary of American Painters. Poughkeepsie: Apollo, 1984
“Gifted
Artist Gets 1928 Medal for Colorado Work.” The Buffalo Courier, 3
February, 1929
Havlice, P. P. Index to Artistic
Biography. New Jersey: Scarecrow, 1973: 1228
“J.E. Thompson, widely
known artist, dead.” The Denver Post, May 24, 1945: 9
“John
Thompson is Named for Denver Art Hall of Fame.” The Rocky Mountain News,
June 30, 1929
“John Thompson Scores in long battle... ” The
Rocky Mountain News, June 4, 1939: 9
Mallett, D.T. Mallett’s
Index of Artists. NY: P.Smith, 1948
McGlauflin, A.C. Who’s Who
in American Art. Washington: American Federation of Arts, 1935 continuing
to NY: Cattell Press, 1976
McNeil, B. Artists Master Index. Detroit:
Gale Research Tower, 1986: 618
McMechen E. “Brinton Terrace.” Colorado
Magazine, XXIV, 1947 : 97-114
Miller, A.A. “Painters of the Rocky
Mountain Region.” Design. vol.43 no.8, April 1942: 3-5
Ramus,
C. “John Edward Thompson: Dean of Colorado Painters.” Art Education,
Denver: Denver U.P. April 1943
Thompson, J.E. Manuscripts at the Denver
Public Library Denver, CO.
“Thompson Watercolors shown.” The
Rocky Mountain News, 1 February 1945: 19
Young, W. A Dictionary of
American Artists, Sculptors, and Engravers. Cambridge: Arno, 1968: 455
