American Monotypes from the Baker/Pisano Collection | Page 31

William Henry Clapp

(American, b. Canada, 1879–1954)
Alone, 1919

Color monotype, 5 x 6 7/8 in.
Chazen Museum of Art, gift of D. Frederick Baker from the
Baker/Pisano Collection, 2014.6.19

Born in Montreal to American parents, Clapp first studied at
the Montreal Art Association School before moving to Paris in
1904 where he studied at the Académie Julian and the Académie
Colarossi. He lived in Cuba from 1915 to 1916 after his father
bought a pineapple plantation. Shortly thereafter Clapp settled
in Oakland, California, where he became director of the
Oakland Art Gallery (later the Oakland Museum) and worked
for the rest of his life. He was also a member of “The Society of
Six,” an impressionist/plein air group of artists. As director of
the museum, he mounted some of the first exhibitions of
various European artists, including Wassily Kandinsky,
Paul Klee, and the American-born Lyonel Feininger, in the
United States.
NOTES:
Boas, Society of Six, 45-51.
St. John, “The Society of Six,” 179–188.

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