"Seaside Embrace" Grace Huntley Pugh Original Artwork, Watercolor, Pen & Ink

Description

Grace Huntley Pugh was one of the longest standing members of the Rockport Art Association with a membership extending back … more Grace Huntley Pugh was one of the longest standing members of the Rockport Art Association with a membership extending back to 1944 and a member of the American Watercolor Society. Her oil and watercolor paintings have been exhibited in national, regional and solo shows. They are in numerous public and private collections. She attended Wellesley College and was graduated from Barnard College in 1934 with a BA in History of Art and Architecture. She then pursued graduate studies in NYC at the National Academy of Design Art School, the Art Students League, and the Parsons School of Design. While studying art, Pugh was also a Powers fashion model and modeled for her teacher and mentor, renowned painter, Leon Kroll. She is memorialized in his mural, "The Defeat of Justice," for the Main Office of the Attorney General in the Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. Pugh's first job was as artist-in-residence and head of the art department of Briarcliff Junior College in New York and she became an art director at Young and Rubicam, the advertising agency in New York City. Following the WWII, she moved to Mamaroneck, NY, a Westchester suburb of NYC, where she was the founding president of the Mamaroneck Artists Guild and was involved with multiple community art, historic preservation, and conservation projects through the decades all of which she received great acclaim on multiple occasions for her vision, leadership, spirit, and generosity to the community. She received multiple proclamations honoring her contributions to the community, including from the President of the United States. Pugh spent decades painting on Cape Ann every summer. She knew the Rockport and Gloucester harbors intimately because of the fine detail she drew in her works. She especially loved painting Pigeon Cove and Lanesville Harbor. less