Thalia Westcott (1877-1963)

An American artist, Thalia Westcott was born Newark, New Jersey, the daughter of Robert Estling and Ada (Peters) Westcott. In 1902 she married Stephen C. Millett in New York City. According to the 1920 census, the couple lived in Manhattan where he was listed as a banker and she as an artist with her own studio. The household also supported six maids, a butler and a chauffeur. Ironically, it was about this time that she obtained a divorce from her first husband. She then married David C. Malcom in January of 1921.

Artistically, she is known to have studied in New York with Randell Davey and also in Paris with Albert Andre. In 1919, after the end of WWI, she applied for a passport to go to France to "draw and paint the devastated regions of France for use in the publication McClure's. The artist held solo exhibits of her work in 1917, 1920, 1926, 1937 and 1941 at Milch, Macbeth, and Durand-Ruel Galleries in New York, among others.

The New York Evening Post gave the following critique of her 1926 exhibit: "Paintings by Thalia Malcom are on view at the Durand-Ruel Galleries. These canvases reveal a freshness of vision and a sensitiveness to subtle aspects of beauty which gives the whole exhibition a character quite its own. The "Etretat," a subject so beloved of many artists, is an engaging version of this picturesque spot competently handled and instilled with a delicate poetic charm.

The individual character of each landscape seems to be felt so honestly that its rendering brings conviction. The coast of Maine or the coast of France preserves not only precision of factual statement to distinguish locale, but each transmits a distinctive quality quite apart from topographical accuracies.

Flower paintings or landscapes are handled ably with good brushwork and structure and they are also informed with a personal sentiment that gives them peculiar appeal."

Thalia Westcott Millett Malcom was a member of the Society of Independent Artists, The American Federation of Art, the American Artists Professional League and the New York Watercolor Club. She is known to have signed her work as Thalia Millett and Thalia Malcom. Strangely, some of her work was also signed as Thalia Malcolm.

In 1922 she received an inheritance from her father, the founder of Westcott Express Company - which was to later become part of American Express Company - of about two million dollars. This allowed her to live in England and later France as a lady of independent means. At the time of her son's wedding in 1933 she was living in Rake Manor, Milford, Surrey, an historic estate. She died of congestive heart failure in France and was buried at Neuilly-sur-Seine.

Submitted by Edward P. Bentley. Art Researcher and Collector, Greenville, Michigan


Sources:
Peter Hastings Falk, Editor, Who Was Who in American Art
Census records, passport applications, and other records at Ancestry.com.