A Forgotten Cosmopolitan

 Clues from the past

The story of painter Richard Hall (1860-1942) came up six years ago in a newspaper article in the archives of the Pori Art Museum where I worked. The article had appeared in a Finnish newspaper Satakunnan Kansa in 1975. In it, Mauri R. Hall, the grandson of the artist's brother, recounted the life of this artist who had been forgotten in the mists of history. At the time, I researched Hall's life story on the Internet and wrote an article about him for the Finnish Wikipedia.

 

Schoolchildren, handicraf
Richard Hall: La classe manuelle. École de petites filles (Finistère), 1889
Musée des beaux-Arts de Rennes

A variable life

Richard Hall's life turned out to be quite interesting: his father was British, his mother Swiss-French. Born in Pori, Finland, Hall's family moved to Helsinki in the 1960s, then to London and Stockholm. Richard Hall studied at the Stockholm Academy of Fine Arts. In 1881, aged only 21, he won a history painting competition organised by the Swedish Academy of Arts and made his breakthrough. The scholarship he received as a prize enabled him to continue his studies in Paris, and he then lived in Brittany. In the 1880s, the region was very popular with artists because of its distinctive culture. After the early death of his wife, he lived for 8 months in a monastery in Nantes with Trappist monks, painting monastic life. From the early 1900s, he spent winters in New York, returning to Europe for the summers. At that time Hall was a popular portrait painter. For the rest of his life, Hall lived in Mar del Plata, Argentina, continuing his artistic work as an illustrator, among other things.

Into the mists of history

The artist, who lived a volatile life, seemed to have fallen into the mists of history: no recent research or literature could be found about him. In his lifetime, he was much better known: he was mentioned in artist encyclopedias and interviewed in The New York Times, among others. I also found that there were two different dates of birth for the artist: some sources claim that he was born in 1857, others in 1860. According to the certificate of office I received from the Evangelical Lutheran Parish of Pori, Richard Hall was born on 18 April 1860. His older brother Edward was born on 31 August 1857. It is possible that the dates of birth of the brothers have got mixed up at some point.

Research project

I decided that Richard Hall's life deserved to be studied. Thanks to a grant from the Svenska Kulturfonden i Björneborg, I will be able to survey Richard Hall's artistic production and the source material about him. Many thanks to SKiB for giving me this opportunity! In the coming months, I will report on the information I find on the blog. The aim is to complete the picture of Richard Hall and to find a place for this forgotten artist in art history.




Places where Richard Hall lived.
Atlas Larousse Illustré, 1900



Photo sources:

Richard Hall: La classe manuelle. École de petites filles(Finistère).
Musée des beaux-Arts de Rennes
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Richard_Hall_La_classe_manuelle.jpg

Atlas Larousse Illustré, 1900. Political world map with profiles of mountains.
David Rumsey Map Collection, list no 0418.195
Source: Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Larousse_world_map,_1900.jpg


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