Cameron Burnside (1887-1952), Philadelphia, PN

Cameron Burnside was an internationally famous portrait painter and water colorist. He was noted for his portraits of well-known Philadelphians. Burnside was born in London, studied art at the London County Council school and eventually exhibited paintings at the salons of the London Academy. Later he moved to New York and eventually moved to Paris to join the American artists’ colony.

When the draft law went into effect, Burnside was in Madrid. While there, he registered at the American Embassy and returned to Paris. A physical exam designated him for Red Cross work, and he was assigned to work in a warehouse in Paris. He sorted and piled boxes of supplies constantly arriving from America until he became Ill.

Due to his illness, his commanding officer asked him what else he could do besides move boxes. Burnside responded that he was an artist and suggested that “the great piles of packing cases and bales of goods and clothing sent to France by generous people in America, something unique in history, one nation aiding the homeless and unfortunate of a sister nation - should be made part of America’s historical records in oil.” The idea caught on and Burnside painted eight large canvases depicting the American Red Cross relief work in France. The paintings were put on display in the main building of the Red Cross National Headquarters in Washington D.C.


Written and submitted by Justin Vining, historian of early Indiana artists. He found this information while researching Lillie Fry Fisher, who exhibited at the Indiana Hoosier Salon and who had studied in Paris under Cameron Burnside.

References:
"The History of the Red Cross-Painted, Not Written", New York Tribune, February 23, 1919

"Cameron Burnside, 64, Dies; Famous Portrait Painter," Obituary, The Philadelphia Inquirer, March 28, 1952

Cameron Burnside was born of American parents in London. In Washington, DC, he had a studio and established the School of Modern Art on 17th St., N.W., where he and his wife taught.

Burnside was a special painter for the American Red Cross during WWI, and then lived in the Districk of Columbia from 1924 to 1931. He returned to Paris after leaving Washington, DC, and studied in Paris at the Academy de la Grande Chaumiere and with teachers Rene Menard, Rupert Bunny and Lucien Simon.

Returning to America he was active in Philadelphia from 1940 to at least 1948.

Associations included Société des Artistes Indepéndants; Société Nationale des Beaux Arts; Society of Washington Artists (exec. committee, 1927); Washington Society of Mural Painters; Washington Watercolor Club (board of managers, 1926).

Exhibitions: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1909, 1914, 1924-25, 1942, 1945, 1947; Washington Art Club; Pan.-Pacific Exposition San Francisco, 1915 (medal); French Colonial Exposition, Marseilles, 1922 (gold); Corcoran Gallery, 1923, 1926; Vandyke Galleries, Washington, DC; Washington Watercolor Club; Society of Washington Artists; National Academy of Design; Royal Academy; Paris Salon, McClees Gallery, Philadelphia Award: Officer of the Order of Nichan Iftikhar.


Source:
Peter Hastings Falk, Editor, Who Was Who in American Art