Wyeth, Andrew, 1917-2009

Andrew Newell Wyeth ( WY-eth; July 12, 1917 – January 16, 2009) was an American visual artist and one of the best-known American artists of the middle 20th century. Though he considered himself to be an "abstractionist", Wyeth was primarily a realist painter who worked in a regionalist style, often painting the land and people of his hometown in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, and his summer home in Cushing, Maine. His father, the illustrator and artist N. C. Wyeth, was a key member of the Brandywine School of artists and illustrators. N.C. Wyeth gave Andrew art lessons as a child, during which he developed the skills to create landscapes, illustrations, figures, and watercolor paintings. His influences included the landscape artist Winslow Homer, American philosopher and naturalist Henry David Thoreau, and filmmaker King Vidor. Wyeth's wife, Betsy, managed his career and was a strong influence in his work. His son Jamie Wyeth is also an artist. One of the best-known images in 20th-century American art is his 1948 tempera painting Christina's World, which is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. He is also known for The Helga Pictures and his paintings of windows. In addition to being awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1988, Wyeth was the first painter to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the first American artist since John Singer Sargent to be elected to the French Académie des Beaux-Arts.