Mary Ann Wilson (or Willson) was one of the large number of American watercolorists who painted between 1800 and 1825. In this century, however, her work was not seen until the 1940's, when the Harry Stone Gallery of New York City acquired twenty of her watercolors and a letter of comment signed by "An Admirer of Art."¹ The unidentified author of the four-page letter claimed to have visited the artist in Greenville, Greene County, New York. The letter itself appears to have been written about 1850, since it refers to Thomas Cole, Asher B. Durand, and Daniel Huntingdon as "modern" painters.

At the time the Stone gallery procured the paintings an appreciation for American primitive art was growing. In the 1920's the Whitney Studio Club of New York City (later the Whitney Museum of American Art) and several galleries began to exhibit it; in the 1930's there were a number of major museum shows of American folk art; and in the 1940's the first books to deal exclusively with the subject began to appear. Although twentieth-century painters and sculptors responded to the powerful linear rhythms and abstract designs of the early American works, Mary Ann Willson's paintings were undoubtedly startling in 1944. They were among the crudest nineteenth-century American watercolors that had yet come to light. Their subject matter includes Biblical scenes, portraits, genre scenes, birds, and flowers. The rich, unmixed colors are principally oranges, blues, russet, and black. Large, flat areas of color surprisingly balanced with areas of tiny, repetitive patterns are characteristic of Mary Ann Willson's watercolors.² Occasionally she incorporated riotous patterns within the figures, as in the body of the mermaid (shown in figure 1). At other times she used patterns to form the backdrop for a painting.

FIGURE 1

Mary Ann Willson followed her own rules of distortion and color to create exciting works of art which have a twentieth-century sense of abstract design. In fact, there has been speculation that the paintings and accompanying document were concocted in this century in order to benefit from the growing market for folk art. However, this is not the case, for Mary Ann Willson is documented in Lionel de Lisser's Picturesque Catskills, Greene County, which first appeared in 1894.³ At that time local legends and recollections about Mary Ann Willson still lingered in Greene County, and were duly recorded in Picturesque Catskills. Illustrated were two of her watercolors (Figs. 2, 3) which belonged to Theodore Cole, a local resident who was the oldest son of Thomas Cole the painter. Even from black and white reproductions it is apparent that these pictures are stylistically related to the twenty watercolors exhibited at the Harry Stone Gallery in 1944.

It seems likely that Sallyann was painted from life. The sharply upturned nose, small bow mouth, elaborate hairdo, repetitive patterns in the collar and dress, and free handling of the paint all relate this to the other watercolors of Mary Ann Willson. The method of framing the central figure was used in other Willson works, such as the drapery which frames Nuestro Senora de monte Carmelo (Fig. 4).

FIGURE 4

The handwriting of the inscription on Sallyann matches the script found on a number of other Willson watercolors (see Figs. 4, 5, 8, 10, 12; Pls. I, II). In all the artist's works on which handwriting appears (eleven of the twenty-two recorded watercolors) the inscription is an integral part of the composition.

Ruth and Boaz (Fig. 3) is a Biblical subject painted by many folk artists. Although Biblical folk paintings often shared a common source, frequently a print, Willson's Ruth and Boaz is not related in composition to any other folk painting that I have seen, and its print source, if it has one, has not been identified. A surprising feature of Ruth and Boaz is the cupid in the foreground, clearly identified by the inscription Cupit on the tablet or lyre he holds. Although it is rare to find a pagan figure in a Christian story, bodiless angels resembling the cupid appear in Nuestro Senora de monte Carmelo (Fig. 4), and a cupid fountain can be seen in The Prodigal Son Reclaimed (Fig. 10).

The present whereabouts of Sallyann and Ruth and Boaz is unknown, and I have been able to locate only seventeen of the twenty watercolors exhibited by the Harry Stone Gallery. Although Mary Ann Willson is only known for twenty-two paintings (see checklist) she is said to have sold her works form "Canada to Mobile."⁴

What little we know of Willson's life and work is contained in Picturesque Catskills, the letter from the Admirer of Art, and a second letter (unsigned) that came to light in 1967 among the papers of Theodore L. Prevost.⁵ The tone, style, and handwriting of the two letters are the same. In all three sources Mary Ann Willson is depicted as living in a log house on a few acres of land with a Miss Brundage, who farmed while Mary Ann painted. According to the Admirer of Art, they had a "romantic attachment for each other." Despite the suggestion of lesbianism, they were apparently accepted by Greene County society, and their long stay there was marked by the sale of a great many paintings. The account in Picturesque Catskills says that:

Since neither woman is listed in the land records at the Catskill courthouse or in any census of Greene County, it is possible that they were squatters. Several Brundages do appear in early Greene County records, bu none can be identified as the Miss Brundage under discussion. Perhaps she and Mary Ann Willson came to Greene County because a relative of hers was already living there.

Assuming that both letters were written by the same person, and given the fact that the information and some of the phrases contained in the letters also appear in Picturesque Catskills, it is possible that the same person was the source for all three. Mable Parker Smith, the historian of Greene County, has argued that Theodore L. Prevost was the Admirer of Art, and De Lisser affirms that Prevost was the discoverer⁷ of Mary Ann Willson. This is possible, since Prevost came from a family which had helped found Greenville and continued to support its development.⁸ On the other hand, samples of Prevost's handwriting fail to match the admirer's. Another possibility for the admirer is Theodore Cole, who owned Sallyann and Ruth and Boaz when they were published in Picturesque Catskills and whose father, Thomas Cole, was married to a cousin of Theodore Prevost.

Notwithstanding the little we know about Mary Ann Willson and her admirer, her works stand as a tribute to her individuality as a painter. Her paintings bear no stylistic kinship to those of other Greene County artists but, like many nineteenth-century painters, she was at least occasionally inspired by prints. A series of paintings based on the parable of the Prodigal Son, a popular theme in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, was done after the etched and engraved edition of the subject illustrated in Figures 6, 7, 9, and 11.⁹

FIGURE 5

In The prodigal Son taking his leave of his Father (Fig. 5) Miss Willson apparently began to copy the wallpaper in the print (Fig. 6), but stopped after completing only a corner. Even that corner, however, has a boldness far exceeding that of the original. She has accentuated the outline of the bird cage by enlivening the top and base with simple patterns, and she has ignored the wire mesh of the cage in favor of a silhouette of the bird. She also ignored the carpet design, although the minute patterns that appear in other areas are reminiscent of the etched and engraved lines.

PL. 1

In The prodigal Son wasted his substance (Pl. 1) the modeling of the headdress on the central female figure consists simply of dashes. The figured carpet of the print (Fig. 7) has been replaced by a wash of blue, and the couch and bolster by a sweep of orange. The folds of the napkin on the lap of the woman seated in the foreground are dots in the watercolor, and the elaborate background has been severely simplified. The white edges that outline areas of color resemble those in the watercolors of Henri Matisse. Miss Willson's painting is a new work of art, totally different in feeling from the one that inspired her. Its affinity to twentieth-century abstraction is evident in all the watercolors of Mary Ann Willson, including the others in the Prodigal Son series. The prodigal Son in Misery (Fig. 8) sits amid spotted pigs, his bare feet and legs scraped and bloodied in neat lines. Two ladies gossip behind a fence whose pickets are outlined by thick bands of color and decorated with stripes. The receding row of trees in the print (Fig. 9) has been replaced by a wash of watercolor. In The prodigal Son Reclaimed (Fig. 10) spiked trees appear as flat areas of color, while wall and gate (Fig. 11) have been reduced to a few simple lines.

FIGURE 8

FIGURE 10

There are many questions still to be answered about the origins of and influences on Mary Ann Willson's works, but one thing is certain --they are not twentieth-century fakes. They are the product of one of the most original nineteenth-century folk watercolorists yet discovered.

PL. II

FIGURE 13

FIGURE 14

¹The letter is in the M. and M. Karolik Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

²Tiny patterns similar to those used by Willson appear in William and Mary, an oil painting on wood done by the Greene County artist J. N. Eaton about 1845. It is in the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Collection and is illustrated in Jean Lipman and Alice Winchester, The Flowering of American Folk Art (New York, 1974), p. 42.

³First published in Northampton, Mass., the book contains more than eight hundred photographs and illustrations that De Lisser collected all over Greene County in 1893. In 1967 Charles E. Dornbusch reissued it, adding a foreword by Alf Evers and an index.

⁴De Lisser, Picturesque Catskills, p. 136. The same information is given in the letter from the Admirer of Art.

⁵This letter is in the Vedder library, Bronck House Museum, Coxsackie, New York. After his death in 1895 Prevost's papers were taken to the estate of the painter Thomas Cole (who had been married to a cousin of Prevost) by Prevost's two daughters, who lived there with Cole's granddaughter Florence Cole Vincent. On the death of Florence Vincent, the estate passed to her niece Edith Cole Hill, who put it up for auction. According to Raymond Beecher, curator of the Bronck House Museum, and Mable Parker Smith, historian of Greene County, Edith Cole Hill found the letter while searching through the papers before the auction.

⁶De Lisser, Picturesque Catskills, p. 134.

⁷Ibid., p.136.

⁸Theodore Prevost's great-grandfather Augustine Prevost was one of the original settlers of Greenville, and his grandfather Augustine Prevost (1744-1821) donated land for a park and a church in the town.

⁹This American edition of the series has been attributed by D. Roger Howlett of Childs Gallery in Boston to Cornelius Tiebout, 1790-1795. The prints are the mirror image of those in a 1794 edition published by Laurie and Whittle in England. Willson's watercolors combine elements found only in the Laurie and Whittle prints with others found only in those attributed to Tiebout.

Fig. 1. Marimaid, by Mary Ann Willson of Greenville, New York (w. 1800-1825). Ink and watercolor on paper, 13 by 16 inches. New York State Historical Association.

Fig. 2. Sallyann, by Willson. Whereabouts unknown; photograph from Lionel R. De Lisser, Picturesque Catskills, Greene County (Northampton, Mass, 1894), p. 107.

Fig. 3. Ruth and Boaz, by Willson. Whereabouts unknown; photograph from Lionel R. De Lisser, Picturesque Catskills, Greene County (Northampton, Mass, 1894), p. 106.

Fig. 4. Nuestra Senora de monte Carmelo (Our Lady of Mount Carmel), by Willson. Ink and watercolor on paper, 12 1/8 by 9 11/16 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, M. and M. Karolik Collection.

Fig. 5. The prodigal Son taking his leave of his Father, by Willson, Inscribed across the bottom: The prodigal Son taking his leave of his Father he geathered all together And took his Journey into a far country luke 15-13. Ink and watercolor on paper, 10 1/8 by 12 7/8 inches. National Gallery of Art, Edgar Williams and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch Collection.

Fig. 6. The prodigal Son taking Leave of his Father, attributed to Cornelius Tiebout, 1790-1795. Hand-colored engraving and etching, 13 3/4 by 10 3/4 inches. Colonial Williamsberg; photograph by courtesy of Childs Gallery.

Fig. 7. The Prodigal Son revelling with Girls, attributed to Tiebout, 1790-1795. Hand-colored engraving and etching, 13 3/4 by 10 3/4 inches. Colonial Williamsberg; photograph by courtesy of Childs Gallery.

Fig. 8. The prodigal Son in Misery, by Willson. Inscribed across the bottom: The prodigal Son in Misery he would Fain have filled his belly with the husks that the Swine Did Eat luke 16. Ink and watercolor on paper, 10 1/8 by 12 1/2 inches. National Gallery of Art, Garbisch Collection.

Fig. 9. The Prodigal Son in Misery, attributed to Tiebout, 1790-1795. Hand-colored engraving and etching, 13 3/4 by 10 3/4 inches. Colonial Williamsberg; photograph by courtesy of Childs Gallery.

Pl. I. The prodigal Son wasted his Substance, by Willson. Inscribed across the bottom: The prodigal Son wasted his Substance With riotous living luke 15-13. Ink and watercolor on paper, 12 1/2 by 10 inches. National Gallery of Art, Garbisch Collection.

Pl. II. Henry On his pet goat, by Willson. Ink and watercolor on paper, 7 7/8 by 6 1/2 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Karolik Collection.

Fig. 10. The prodigal Son Reclaimed, by Willson. Inscribed across the bottom: The prodigal Son Reclaimed father I have Sinned against heaven And in thy sight And am no more worthy to be called thy Son - Luke 15-21. Ink and watercolor on paper, 10 by 12 5/8 inches. National Gallery of Art, Garbisch Collection.

Fig. 11. The Prodigal returned Home Reclaimed, attributed to Tiebout, 1790-1795. Hand-colored engraving and etching, 13 3/4 by 10 3/4 inches. Colonial Williamsberg; photograph by courtesy of Childs Gallery.

Fig. 12. Three Angel Heads, by Willson. Inscribed at lower center: Angels now are hovering round us/Unprocevd thay mix the throng/ Wondering at the love that crowned us/ Glad to joyn the holy Song. Ink and watercolor on paper, 16 by 13 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Karolik Collection.

Fig. 13. Young Woman Pointing to a Flight of Birds, by Willson. Watercolor on paper, 7 15/16 by 6 1/2 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Karolik Collection.

Fig. 14. Floral Fantasy, By Willson. Watercolor on paper, 7 7/8 by 6 1/2 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Karolik Collection.

Floral Fantasy; see Fig. 14

Floral Spray, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, 6 7/8 by 8 15/16 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

General Washington on Horse, 1800-1825. Ink and watercolor on paper, 12 7/8 by 15 15/16 inches. Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design.

Henry On his pet goat; see Pl.II

The Leave Taking, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, 10 11/16 by 13 11/16 inches. The painting is another version of The prodigal Son taking his leave of his Father (Fig. 5). Museum of Fin Arts, Boston.

Lovers, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, 6 1/4 by 7 15/16 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Marimaid; see Fig. 1

Nuestra Senora se monte Carmelo; see Fig. 4

Parrot, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, 6 1/2 by 7 15/16 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Pelican, 1800-1825. Ink and watercolor on paper, 6 7/8 by 16 inches. Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design.

The prodigal Son in Misery; see Fig. 8

The prodigal Son Reclaimed; see Fig. 10

The prodigal Son taking his leave of his Father; see Fig. 5

The prodigal Son wasted his Substance; see Pl. I

Queen of Sheba, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, approximately 13 by 16 inches. Whereabouts unknown.

Ruth and Boaz; see Fig. 3

Sallyann; see Fig. 2

Summer, 1800-1825. Inscribed in the lower margin: I neither want your ring nor money/I want a lad will call me honey/ There's a ring cost many a shilling/ That you may have, if you are willing. Watercolor on paper, approximately 13 by 16 inches. Whereabouts unknown.

Three Angel Head; see Fig. 12

A tree of Life, 1800-1825. Ink and watercolor on paper, approximately 13 by 16 inches. Whereabouts unknown.

Young Woman Pointing to Flight of Birds; see Fig. 13

Young Woman Wearing a Turban, 1800-1825. Watercolor on paper, 7 7/8 by 6 1/2 inches. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.