Harry Neyland (1877-1958)

Harry Neyland (1877-1958)

Born in Erie, Pennsylvania, Harry Neyland graduated from Pennsylvania State Normal College and after demonstrating a predilection towards the arts, enrolled at Zanerian Art College in Columbus, Ohio. He continued his training in New York, first at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn under the direction of Arthur Wesley Dow and later studying at the Art Students League.  Like his contemporaries, Neyland then went abroad to further his education, working under Henry B. Snell in England and later traveling to Paris to enroll in the Académies Colarossi and Julian.                 

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Upon his return to the United States, Neyland became the first art director of the New York Military Academy at Cornwall on the Hudson, and later moved to Ontario, Canada, where he headed the Hamilton Art School.  He spent several more years studying in Europe and eventually settled in New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1911, accepting the position of Director of the Swain Free School of Design, which he held until 1930. Neyland kept a studio in town, where he actively worked painting shore line views and scenes of the shipping industry, and spent much of his time watching and sketching the boats coming in and out of the harbor.

In addition to the Providence Art Club, Neyland exhibited with the National Academy of Design, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Boston Art Club and the New Bedford Art Club, and today his work can be found in the permanent collections of the Mariners Museum in Newport News, Virginia and the New Bedford Whaling Museum.

References: Falk, Who Was Who in American Art, 1999; Pease, Zephaniah W. (Ed.), History of New Bedford, Vol. II (New York: The Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1918), pp. 256-262; Mary Jean Blasdale, Artists of New Bedford, A Biographical Dictionary (New Bedford, MA: Old Dartmouth Historical Society, 1990); Harry Neyland (1877-1958), New Visions, New Bedford Whaling Museum exhibition catalogue, 2004; Cuttyhunk Historical Society postcard of Church’s Beach; Providence Art Club archives. 

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