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Born in New York in 1855, Charles Jay Taylor received a law degree from Columbia University and later studied at the Art Students League, the National Academy of Design with Eastman Johnson, and at the City College of New York. He later studied in London and Paris. Taylor produced newspaper illustrations for New York's Daily Graphic and was an active member of the Young Men's Radical League for the Seventh Assembly District in New York City.
Taylor also produced illustrations for Harpers, Puck, and Punch, and became internationally famous for his books on the "Taylor Girls." He also illustrated H. C. Bunner's Short Sixes. He exhibited his drawings at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo in 1901 (prize); the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco in 1915, winning a medal, the hors concours (jury of awards); and at the Sesquicentennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1926 (medal). Taylor moved to Pittsburgh in 1911 to serve as the first head of the Illustration Department in the School of Applied Design at the Carnegie Institute of Technology.
He was a member of the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, and exhibited with them from the time of their first exhibition in 1910, where his work received favorable reviews by critic Maud Carrell in the Pittsburgh Dispatch, to his death in 1929. In 1914, Taylor served as president of the organization and chaired the jury for that year. Taylor received a jury award at the Associated Artists' ninth exhibition at the Carnegie Institute in 1918.
Included in the exhibition were his two crayon drawings, Coming From Work, Four Mile Run and National Tube Works from Soho Hill, 5th Ave. In these two landscapes, he presents a view of the neighborhoods that grew up around the various industries in Pittsburgh. Beyond the houses and hillside tenements rise the smoking chimneys of the factories that are the life-blood of the town. Taylor reduces his forms to a minimum of outline, shading and color, allowing the natural color of the paper to remain visible throughout each composition. Coming From Work was awarded the Hors Concours - Member Jury Award at the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco in 1915.
Taylor's work is represented in the collection of the One Hundred Friends of Pittsburgh Art, and was included in the exhibition of the collection at the Carnegie Institute in 1942. He is also included in the collections the National Museum of American History's Division of Prints at the Smithsonian Institution.
Sources:
Brignano, Mary. The Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, 1910-1985, The First Seventy-Five Years. Pittsburgh: Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, 1985.
Falk, Peter Hastings (edit.). Who Was Who In American Art. Madison, CT: Sound View Press, 1985. Fielding, Mantle. Dictionary of American painters, sculptors, and engravers. New York: James F. Carr, 1971.
French, Joseph L., "Looking Backward," The Bookman, June 1926, p. 447. ìInto the Shadowsî (Obituary), Carnegie Magazine, vol. 11, no. 7, February 1929, p. 278.
Muller, Hermann Alexander. Allegemeines Kunstler Lexicon. Franfort-on-Main, 1895-1901, supplement, vol. 5. ìObituary,î Pittsburgh Post Gazette, January 21, 1929.
O'Connor, John Jr., "One Hundred Friends Exhibition," with illustration of His Breakfast in Carnegie Magazine, vol. 16, November 1942, pp. 168-170.
Sheon, Aaron, "1913: Forgotten Cubist Exhibitions in America," Arts Magazine, March 1983, pp. 93-107.
Smith, R. A. Taylor File, Pennsylvania Room, Carnegie Library, Pittsburgh.
This document copyright © 1996, Eric John Schruers