About Jessie Willcox Smith

  • Biography

    A pre-eminent illustrator and student of Howard Pyle in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, she was known for her Good Housekeeping magazine covers of which she did several hundred and for other children's story illustrations.

    She was educated at the School of Design for Women* and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts* in Philadelphia from 1885 to 1888, and in 1888, had her first illustrations published in St. Nicholas magazine. In 1894, she began study with Howard Pyle, who made illustration seem happy and easy, an attitude she welcomed after the what she perceived as the serious, moody, coldness of the atmosphere at the Pennsylvania Academy. Pyle teamed Smith with Violet Oakley to do colour chromolit...

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