Lot 942: Elizabeth Shippen Green (American, 1871-1954) School for Dollies Initialed "E.S.G.E." u.l., i...

Elizabeth Shippen Green (American, 1871-1954)

School for Dollies
Initialed "E.S.G.E." u.l., inscribed "An American Home - the world's ideal./
AMERICAN DEAL Radiators Boilers," probably in a later hand, on the reverse.
Watercolor, charcoal and gouache on illustration board, sight size 19 5/8 x 16 1/2 in. (49.8 x 41.9 cm), framed.
Condition: Front mat adhered to board, support very slightly warped, mild toning.


Provenance: By descent through the family of the owner.


N.B. Elizabeth Shippen Green was born to a prominent Philadelphia family; she was the daughter of Jasper Green, who worked for Harper¹s as an illustrator during the Civil War. By the 1890s illustration was growing and the vast majority of readers were women, yet very few publications featured work by female artists and "magazine editors actively sought out qualified artists who could delineate a feminine point of view." (1) Encouraged by her father, Green displayed artistic talent early on. Her first published illustration, featuring a child and her doll, appeared in the Philadelphia Times, on her 18th birthday. Soon after, Green started classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, however, finding the atmosphere gloomy, she left to study with preeminent illustrator Howard Pyle, at Drexel University.

Green soon became close friends with fellow female illustrators Jessie Wilcox Smith and Violet Oakley. The three women, with their close friend Henrietta Cozens, moved in to the Red Rose Inn and were thus dubbed the ³Red Rose Girls.² There the women lived and worked together, each enjoying successful careers during America¹s golden age of illustration. Green produced images for Harper¹s, Ladies¹ Home Journal and the Saturday Evening Post.



(1) Carter, Alice A. "The Red Rose Girls" (New York, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.), 2000, pg. 26.