From Humble Beginnings: Vose Galleries in the 1840s

Joseph Vose had been a shoe manufacturer before he decided to branch into the art business. In 1841, he purchased the Westminster Art Gallery in Providence, Rhode Island, an art supply store that had been started by local artist Ransom Hicks. Primarily involved in sales of molding, cord, prints and picture frames, Westminster Gallery was only marginally involved in what was then a quiet art market, revolving mainly around commissioned works.

Joseph’s nineteen-year-old son, Seth, soon developed an interest in the gallery and in 1850 took over running the business. While the first decade involved selling primarily art supplies, an entry from an early account book shows the sale of a painting as early as 1853. Seth Vose would soon indulge his passion for buying and selling paintings, and would be responsible for the radical introduction of French Barbizon paintings to the Boston art market.

Embracing the Avante Garde: Seth M. Vose in the 1850s

At the time T. Worthington Whittredge was in Switzerland painting “The Lake of Lucerne,” Vose Galleries had entered the second decade of its existence under the stewardship of Seth Morton Vose. Collecting art was becoming a popular pastime in America, and although early ledgers show sales mostly of frames, looking glasses, and brass nails during the 1850s, the occasional entry of the sale of an “oil painting” gives us the first inkling of the role that Seth Vose would play as a major art dealer and arbiter of taste in the decades to come.

It was in the 1850s that Seth Vose, barely 20 years old, discovered and fell in love with the paintings of the Barbizon School, then the avante garde movement in France. Seth’s decision to promote their work would lead him to near financial disaster. At Vose’s first American exhibition of Barbizon painter Camille Corot, not one painting sold! Undaunted, Seth continued to buy works by the Barbizon painters, and by 1857 had collected examples by all painters in the school. It would be over twenty years before Seth sold even one of their canvases.

Dramatic Change: Vose Galleries in the 1860s

The 1860s brought dramatic change to Seth Vose’s obscure Providence, Rhode Island, art supply business. In addition to selling artist materials and frames, Seth began to act as a dealer for local artists. He quickly gained a reputation as a respected dealer, and by the end of the decade many famous artists of the period sought his advice and critical evaluation. Gallery records show early dealings with Martin Johnson Heade, William Bradford, William and James Hart, R. Swain Gifford, George L. Brown, Albert Bierstadt, A.T. Bricher, William Trost Richards, Daniel Huntington and John F. Kensett.

The artists themselves were not the only source of admiration for Seth Vose. Having recovered from a near fatal bout of lock-jaw in 1861 (during which Seth knocked out his front tooth in order to take sustenance), Seth discovered that his partner had brought the gallery to near ruin:

“... he found that his partner had committed the firm far beyond its resources to a purchase of the plate glass used for framing pictures. When he refused to consider bankruptcy as an easy solution, a group of fellow art dealers, headed by Roland Knoedler, bought up the outstanding obligations and handed them to Seth, marked ‘paid’. Within two years after this amazing gesture from his competitors, Seth had justified their faith and reimbursed them in full.”*

In time, Seth Vose’s reputation grew considerably, as did his collection of paintings. His influence as a dealer now extended beyond Providence to nearby Boston, where many prominent patrons were attracted to his good name. By the latter half of the 19th century, Seth Vose had established the respect and admiration that would ensure his place in history as one of America’s foremost art dealers.

*Yankee Magazine, "Story of the Vose Galleries" by Jack Post, Sept. 1973.

In Support of the Barbizon Rebels: Vose Galleries in the 1870s

Seth Vose almost dropped the paints and brushes he had been wrapping. His customer had come bursting out of the picture gallery at the back of the store shouting, “Those paintings in there, where did you get them?”

“I know, I know,” the stranger sputtered. “I’ve lived there and painted beside Corot, Daubigny, Rousseau, all of them. Millet was my teacher.” And before Seth could back away, the visitor had seized him by the shoulders and kissed him on both cheeks.” Thus began Seth’s relationship with William Morris Hunt.*

By the late 1800’s, Corot, Millet, Rousseau, Delacroix and Daubigny were all recognized artists in America. Such was not the case in 1852 when Seth Vose brought the first works by Barbizon painters to America. His first exhibition was a complete disaster – not one painting sold!

Seth Vose possessed an intense passion for Barbizon painting, convinced that Corot was the greatest painter of his day. Vose’s collection of Barbizon paintings numbered in the hundreds, but it took more than twenty years before he would sell even one painting.

Seth Vose and William Morris Hunt were perhaps the first Americans to recognize the brilliance of the Barbizon painters. Hunt’s personal charm and society marriage afforded him great influence amongst Boston collectors. Art patrons such as Martin Brimmer (a founder of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts) began to purchase works by Barbizon painters. A terrific competition for the purchase of Barbizon paintings ensued.

Early support for the Barbizon “rebels” made Boston the American center for the more experimental European art. Thus, by the 1870’s, Seth Vose had achieved recognition for the Barbizons, as well as securing himself an important position in American art history.

*From “The Old Family Business” by Jack Post, Yankee Magazine, 1973.

The Roaring 1880s: Seth Vose Finds Success

I liked his pictures from the first time I saw them, and as I had collected a number of them, I thought I would share my pleasure with my friends and townsmen so I hung them in my rooms and asked people to come and see them. Well they came but they laughed so at my pictures and made such fun of my taste that I took all the Corots down and put them away and did not show them again for a long while.

- Seth Morton Vose, Diary entry.

Although his initial attempts to promote the art of the French Barbizon in America were often disheartening, Seth Morton Vose was never fully discouraged from pursuing this endeavor. As a dedicated believer in these artists, Seth championed their cause for nearly thirty years and established himself as the group’s primary dealer in the United States.

The popularity of the French Barbizon School grew exponentially during the 1880s with an expanding art market that America would not experience again to such a great extent until the 1980s. During this affluent period, Seth was finally rewarded for his efforts and greatly benefited from the emerging interest in his inventory. His firm would come to either import or advise on nearly half of the pre-Impressionist French Paintings in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts collection.

On some occasions, fierce competition even developed among Seth Vose’s collectors of Barbizon art. He recalled one uncomfortable incident when he was seated on a couch with a Boston collector while discussing a painting that stood in front of them in its shadow box. A second Boston collector who was normally known as a consummate gentleman, sized up the situation and tossed his cape over the painting, claiming it for his own. The first client rose, said goodbye to Seth, and left quietly. It would take one-hundred years for the art market to reach another such dramatic decade.