{{Short description|American painter}} {{Infobox artist | name = Dixie Selden | image = Dixie Selden photograph - est 1900 to 1920.jpg | birth_date = {{birth date|1868|02|28}} | birth_place = Cincinnati, Ohio | death_date = {{death date and age|1935|11|15|1868|02|28}} | death_place = Cincinnati, Ohio | field = Painting | training = {{plain list| * McMicken School of Design, now Cincinnati Art Academy * Frank Duveneck * William Merritt Chase * Henry B. Snell * Artists in Paris and Vienna }} | movement = {{plain list| *Munich School (early), *Impressionism (after 1909) }} | works = {{plain list| * ''Frank Duveneck'' (1918) * ''Boats in Harbor'' (circa 1920) * '' Judge A. M. Cochran of Maysville'' }} | awards = }}
'''Dixie Selden''' (February 28, 1868{{spaced ndash}}November 15, 1935) was an American artist. She studied with Frank Duveneck, who was a mentor and significant influence, and William Merritt Chase, who introduced her to Impressionism. Selden painted portraits of Americans and made genre paintings, landscapes and seascapes from her travels within the country and to Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Mexico. She helped found and was twice the president of the Women's Art Club of Cincinnati. Her works have been exhibited in the United States. She was one of the Daughters of the American Revolution and on the Social Register.
==Early life== Dixie Selden, named for the song ''Dixie Land'', was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. She was one of three children of John Roger Selden and Martha Peyton McMillon Selden.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /><ref name="DAR" /> Her parents had ancestors from northern states, New York and Connecticut, who fought during the Revolutionary War,{{efn|Selden, a Daughter of the American Revolution, was a descendant of Levi Smith, of Massachusetts, on her mother's side, and Colonel Samuel Selden, of Connecticut.<ref name="DAR">{{cite book|author=Daughters of the American Revolution|title=Lineage Book|publisher=The Society|url=https://archive.org/details/lineagebook13revogoog|year=1898|page=[https://archive.org/details/lineagebook13revogoog/page/n284 262]}}</ref> See Selden family.}} and her father fought for the Union during the American Civil War,<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> but they were sympathetic to the concerns of the South (aka ''Dixie'').<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /><ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> When she was two years old, the family moved to Covington, Kentucky, across the Ohio River from Cincinnati.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> Dixie Selden was left an only child when two of her siblings died when they were infants.<ref name="Pennington p. 205">{{cite book|author=Estill Curtis Pennington|title=Lessons in Likeness: Portrait Painters in Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, 1802-1920 : Featuring Works from the Filson Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sV12204GZC8C&pg=PA205|year=2011|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-2612-8|page=205}}</ref> Her parents indulged her artistic abilities,<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /> including building her a studio.<ref name="Cin Enquirer">{{cite news | url=http://www2.cincinnati.com/cam/cincinnatiwing/selden.html | title=Dixie Selden Noted Portrait Painter | publisher=Garnett Company | work=The Cincinnati Enquirer | accessdate=November 11, 2014}}</ref> They took her on two tours of Europe in 1878 and 1882 to 1883.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" />
Her parents were active in Cincinnati and Covington social circles and organizations, including The Shakespeare Society. Her mother, Martha, was an associate member of the Covington Art Club and a member of the local literary society, the Culture Club.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" />
==Art education and career== thumb|Frank Duveneck's class: Dixie Selden, middle bottom; Mattie Furber, bottom left [[File:Dixie Selden, Frank Duveneck, 1918, oil on canvas, Cincinnati Art Museum.jpg|thumb|Dixie Selden, ''Frank Duveneck'', 1918, oil on canvas, Cincinnati Art Museum]] [[File:Madeline McDowell Breckinridge by Dixie Selden.jpg|thumb|Dixie Selden, ''Madeline McDowell Breckinridge'', 1920, ''Ashland'', The Henry Clay Estate, Lexington, Kentucky.]] thumb|Dixie Selden, ''Boats in Harbor'', circa 1920 Selden attended Bartholomew's Girls' School in Cincinnati.<ref name="Weidman p. 772">{{cite book|author=Jeffrey Weidman|title=Artists in Ohio, 1787-1900: A Biographical Dictionary|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZdICm_W8xKwC&pg=PA772|year=2000|publisher=Kent State University Press|isbn=978-0-87338-616-6|page=772}}</ref> She enrolled in the McMicken School of Design, now the Art Academy of Cincinnati, in 1884 and studied there off an on until 1912<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /><ref name="Weidman p. 772" /> under Fernand H. Lungren<ref name="Cin Enquirer" /> and Frank Duveneck,<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /><ref name="Weidman p. 772" /> also from Covington. She studied drawing and painting with oils and watercolor.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> Selden was one of Duveneck's favorite students<ref name="Pennington p. 90">{{cite book|author=Estill Curtis Pennington|title=Lessons in Likeness: Portrait Painters in Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, 1802-1920: Featuring Works from the Filson Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sV12204GZC8C&pg=PA90|year=2011|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-2612-8|page=90}}</ref> and he became her mentor who recommended her for commissions and assisted her in having her works shown in "male-dominated" exhibitions.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /> Duveneck also greatly influenced Selden's style. According to author Estill Curtis Pennington, "Frank Duveneck and his followers, Dixie Selden and John Alberts, continued to paint in a venerable high-art style, informed by seventeenth-century precedent and lit by Impressionist innovation."<ref>{{cite book|author=Estill Curtis Pennington|title=Lessons in Likeness: Portrait Painters in Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, 1802-1920 : Featuring Works from the Filson Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sV12204GZC8C&pg=PA95|year=2011|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-2612-8|page=95}}</ref>
Selden won prizes for her oil paintings and portraits that she began to exhibit at the Covington Art Club in 1890. She exhibited four paintings in 1891 at the Cincinnati Art Club. Selden attained the status of a professional artist in 1892 when her works were shown with those of Duveneck, Charles Henry Sharp, Henry Farny, Edward Henry Potthast, and Frank H. Lungren.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> That year, Selden helped found the Women's Art Club of Cincinnati and was its president twice.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /><ref name="Weidman p. 772" /><!--- it's also in the Kentucky Encyclopedia where it appears to be a close paraphrase, any other rewording becomes a close paraphrase with another source.---> She began to work in Covington in 1894 as an illustrator and portraitist.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /> Selden painted ''Daughter of the Revolution'', a self-portrait, in 1894, but she terminated her membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1899 for unknown reasons.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> Beginning in 1895, Selden spent the summers in Edgartown, Massachusetts, Boothbay, Maine, and in France at Normandy and Brittany. During her visits, she made genre works, landscapes, and seascapes.<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /> Selden studied in Venice, Italy with William Merritt Chase.<ref name="Cin Enquirer" /><ref name=Harrison>{{cite book|author=Lowell Hayes Harrison|title=A New History of Kentucky|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=63GqvIN3l3wC&pg=PA335|year=1997|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=0-8131-2008-X|page=335}}</ref> Her style changed considerably after studying with Chase, as she moved from the darker influence of the Munich School to a lighter, impressionistic style<ref name="Cin Enquirer" /> after 1909.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> She also studied in Vienna and Paris with other artists, and in St. Ives, England with Henry B. Snell.<ref name=McChesney />
Selden traveled extensively with fellow artist Emma Mendenhall (1873–1964) throughout the United States, Europe, Mexico, China, Japan, and the Middle East,<ref name="Weidman p. 772" /><ref>{{cite book|author=Jeffrey Weidman|title=Artists in Ohio, 1787-1900: A Biographical Dictionary|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZdICm_W8xKwC&pg=PA588|year=2000|publisher=Kent State University Press |isbn=978-0-87338-616-6|page=588|chapter=Emma Mendenhall}}</ref> painting landscapes, genre scenes, and portraits "with a "broad stroke and sprightly brush."<ref>{{cite book|author1=Best Books on|author2=Federal Writers' Project|title=Cincinnati, a Guide to the Queen City and Its Neighbors|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dW-52BWC4LoC&pg=PA86|year=1943|publisher=Best Books on|isbn=978-1-62376-051-9|page=86}}</ref> The images captured people and street and market scenes. According to biographer Richard M. Sacksteder, she is "one of the premier Impressionists from the Greater Cincinnati area", best known for her "lively landscapes" and portraits.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> Selden painted portraits of Frank Duveneck,<ref name="Pennington p. 91">{{cite book|author=Estill Curtis Pennington|title=Lessons in Likeness: Portrait Painters in Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, 1802-1920 : Featuring Works from the Filson Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sV12204GZC8C&pg=PA91|year=2011|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-2612-8|page=91}}</ref> which is considered "her most powerful portrait";<ref name=McChesney />{{efn|The portrait of Frank Duveneck was used as an illustration for the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts exhibition catalog in 1919. The exhibited painting received "much favorable comment" and was Duveneck's favorite portrait of himself.<ref name=McChesney /> It was also exhibited at the Cincinnati Art Museum and the National Academy of Design in New York.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" />}} ''Mrs. Albert Berne and Her Sons'',<ref>{{cite book|author=Suzanne Berne|title=Missing Lucile: Memories of a Grandmother I Never Knew|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9781565126251|url-access=registration|year=2010|publisher=Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill|isbn=978-1-56512-625-1|pages=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9781565126251/page/264 264], 267}}</ref> Mrs. Mary Emery,<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!437905~!0#focus |title=Mary M. Emery (1844-1927), (painting) |publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System|accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref> and Judge A. M. Cochran of Maysville, Kentucky.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!443439~!0#focus|title=Judge A. M. J. Cochran of Marysville, (painting) |publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System|accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref> Selden also painted images of domestic life, portraits of family members and pets, and flowers.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> She used a turpentine-thinned varnish on her paintings.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Lance Mayer|author2=Gay Myers|title=American Painters on Technique: 1860-1945|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yKw5JiPsBswC&pg=PA121|year=2013|publisher=Getty Publications|isbn=978-1-60606-135-0|page=121}}</ref>
Selden reached national acclaim<ref>{{cite book|author=Emmis Communications|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IusCAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA12|date=June 1973|publisher=Emmis Communications|page=12|issn=0746-8210}}</ref> and her works were exhibited and won prizes throughout the United States.<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /><ref name=Harrison /> Her art was shown at the Art Institute of Chicago, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, New York Academy of Art, and Cincinnati Art Museum,<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> including a 1910 exhibition of her works with those of Emma Mendenhall and Annie G. Sykes.<ref>{{cite book|author=Cincinnati Art Museum|title=Special Exhibition by Emma Mendenhall, Dixie Selden and Annie G. Sykes: Feb. 19-Mar. 10, 1910|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DvBWHAAACAAJ|date=1910}}</ref>
Selden was a member of the National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors, American Women's Art Club, National Arts Club, Southern States Art League, Louisville Art Association, Covington Art Club, and Cincinnati McDowell Society.<ref name=McChesney />
Her painting, ''Boats in Harbor'', was sold for US$32,500 in 2011. The maximum price paid for one of her paintings is reported to be $62,100 by Blouin Art Info.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.blouinartinfo.com/artist/441352/lots |title=Dixie Selden, Art Prices |publisher=Blouin Art Info | accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref>
==Personal life and death== Called "the little one" by Duveneck,<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> she was a petite woman who had a "vivacious, joyous personality" and established many close, lifelong friendships.<ref name=McChesney /> Having never married,<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky">{{cite book|chapter=Chapter S: Dixie Selden|author=Richard M. Sacksteder|title=Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky|editor=Paul A. Tenkotte and James C. Claypool |publisher=The University Press of Kentucky |via=ISSU, republished for the World Wide Web by NKY.com and Enquirer Media. A Project of the Thomas D. Clark Foundation, Inc. | url=http://issuu.com/cincinnati/docs/nky-s/46|pages=818–819|year=2009|isbn=978-0-8131-2565-7|accessdate=November 13, 2014}}</ref> Selden enjoyed a long friendship with fellow Cincinnati artist, Emma Mendenhall.<ref name="Weidman p. 772" />
Her mother, Martha Selden, died in 1907 and father, John, died the following year. Selden stayed on in her parents' home and then in other residences in Covington before moving in 1910 to Walnut Hills, Cincinnati,<ref name="Enc Northern Kentucky" /> where she was listed as a resident of the city on the Social Register in 1918.<ref>{{cite book|title=Social Register Locater|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8csIAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA975|year=1918|publisher=Social Register Association|page=975}}</ref> Selden died suddenly of a heart attack the night of a dinner party in her Walnut Hills house in 1935.<ref name=McChesney>{{cite journal | title=Dixie Selden | author=Mrs. H. V. McChesney | journal=The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society | volume=35 | date=July 1937 | pages=273–276 | number=112 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23371626}}</ref> She is buried in Highland Cemetery, Fort Mitchell, Kentucky.<ref name="Highland Cemetery">{{cite web | url=http://www.highlandcemetery.com/ | title=Welcome to Highland Cemetery: Highlights | publisher=Highland Cemetery | accessdate=November 13, 2014 | archive-date=November 15, 2016 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161115144248/http://www.highlandcemetery.com/ | url-status=dead }}</ref>
A memorial exhibition was held at the Cincinnati Art Museum<ref name="Pennington p. 205" /> from March 5 through April 8, 1936.<ref>{{cite book|author=Dixie Selden|title=Memorial Exhibition of Paintings by Dixie Selden, March 5 Through April 8, 1936|year=1936|publisher=The Museum|location=Cincinnati|oclc= 837738731}}</ref> In 2003, 2006, 2007 and 2008, her works were exhibited with other city artists in the "Panorama of Cincinnati Art" annual shows at the Cincinnati Art Galleries.<ref>{{cite book|author=Emmis Communications|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3gsDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA33|date=December 2003|publisher=Emmis Communications|page=33|issn=0746-8210}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Emmis Communications|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_82W5IryKswC&pg=PA76|date=December 2006|publisher=Emmis Communications|page=76|issn=0746-8210}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Emmis Communications|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BVvtWHYAm0QC&pg=PA72|date=November 2007|publisher=Emmis Communications|page=72|issn=0746-8210}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Emmis Communications|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RDvAchQ1_dYC&pg=RA1-PA250|date=November 2008|publisher=Emmis Communications|page=250|issn=0746-8210}}</ref> Herbert Greer French said in the foreword of the exhibition catalog, "Honest and forceful in her art, as in her life, she gave of her best to every undertaking. Should her painting give to those who see it in the future some measure of beauty of spirit which was hers, the world would be better, even as those who knew her in the flesh were the better for that privilege."<ref name=McChesney />
==Collections== * Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio: ''Cityscape''<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.butlerartcollection.com/searchresults.php?buttonName=&artistName=Dixie+Selden&titleOfWork=&theme=1&movement=1&collectionType=1&sortBy=work_display_name&searchResultStyle=textAndImages |title=Cityscape |publisher=Butler Institute of American Art |accessdate=November 11, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141112095138/http://www.butlerartcollection.com/searchresults.php?buttonName=&artistName=Dixie+Selden&titleOfWork=&theme=1&movement=1&collectionType=1&sortBy=work_display_name&searchResultStyle=textAndImages |archive-date=November 12, 2014 |url-status=usurped }}</ref> * Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio: ''79th and Riverside Drive'', 1915;<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.cincinnatiartmuseum.org/art/collection/collections/?u=6897249 |title=79th and Riverside Drive |publisher=Cincinnati Art Museum |accessdate=November 11, 2014 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20141112095342/http://www.cincinnatiartmuseum.org/art/collection/collections/?u=6897249 |archivedate=November 12, 2014 }}</ref> ''Frank Duveneck'', 1918<ref name="Pennington p. 91" /> ''Aunt Patsy Swiney'', 1919<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.cincinnatiartmuseum.org/art/collection/collections/?u=6928078 |title=Aunt Patsy Swiney |publisher=Cincinnati Art Museum |accessdate=November 11, 2014 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20141112095348/http://www.cincinnatiartmuseum.org/art/collection/collections/?u=6928078 |archivedate=November 12, 2014 }}</ref> and others * Covington Art Club, Kentucky: ''Public Square, Ragusa'' 1924<ref name=McChesney /> * Federal Court Building, Lexington, Kentucky: ''Judge A. M. J Cochran of Maysville''<ref name=McChesney /> * Johnson Collection, Spartanburg, South Carolina: ''Blue Sail, Concarneau''<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!456202~!0#focus | title=Blue Sail, Concarneau | publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System | accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref> * Kenton County Public Library, Kentucky: ''After the Shower, Copenhagen'', ''The Wman Hanging Laundry'', ''Balloon Ascent at Night''.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.kentonlibrary.org/genphotos/index.php?q=Selden | title=Faces and Places - Northern Kentucky Photographic Archives: Dixie Selden | publisher=Kenton County Public Library | accessdate=November 13, 2014 }}</ref> * Kentucky State Historical Society: ''Brittany Woman Knitting''<ref name=McChesney /> * Miami University Art Museum, Oxford, Ohio: ''Carcassonne'', 1922;<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!437926~!0#focus | title=Carcassonne | publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System | accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref> ''Brittany Quai'', 1929;<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!442753~!0#focus | title=Brittany Quai | publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System | accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref> ''Olive Tree'', 1933;<ref>{{cite web | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!437120~!0#focus | title=Olive Tree | publisher=Smithsonian Institution Research Information System | accessdate=November 11, 2014 }}</ref>
==Gallery== <gallery mode="packed" heights="160px"> File:Dixie Selden, 79th St. and Riverside Drive, 1915, oil on canvas, Cincinnati Art Museum.jpg|''79th and Riverside Drive'', 1915, oil on canvas, Cincinnati Art Museum File:Dixie Selden, Aunt Patsy Swiney, 1919, Cincinnati Art Museum.jpg|''Aunt Patsy Swiney'', 1919, Cincinnati Art Museum File:Dixie Selden (1868-1935) - Still life (1926) - Formerly displayed in College Hill Elementary School.JPG|''Still-life'', {{nowrap|c. 1926}}, on loan to Cincinnati Art Museum File:'Patched Sail' by Dixie Selden, on loan to the Cincinnati Art Museum.JPG|''Patched Sail'', {{nowrap|c. 1929}}, on loan to Cincinnati Art Museum </gallery>
==Notes== {{notelist}}
==References== {{reflist|30em}}
==Further reading== * "Dixie Selden", ''The Kentucky Encyclopedia'', John E. Kleber (ed.) (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky), 1992. {{ISBN|0-8131-1772-0}} * McLean, Genetta. ''Dixie Selden: An American Impressionist from Cincinnati 1868-1935'' (Cincinnati: Cincinnati Art Galleriesj, 2001. {{ISBN|0-943633-26-5}}
==External links== {{commons category-inline}}
{{Authority control}}
{{New Woman (late 19th century)}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Selden, Dixie}} Category:1868 births Category:1938 deaths Category:19th-century American painters Category:20th-century American painters Category:Painters from Kentucky Category:Painters from Ohio Category:People from Covington, Kentucky Category:20th-century American women painters Category:19th-century American women painters