America: Painting a Nation

Milton Avery

Date: 1947

Credit Line: Terra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection

Object number: 1992.3

Text Entries: Milton Avery started his artistic career in his early twenties.  Due to the untimely death of his father, brother and brother-in-law, Avery started work at a young age to help support his extended family, which at one point consisted of nine women and children.  After taking on various jobs such as an assembler in a screw factory, a lathe man, and mechanic, Avery saw an advertisement that promised "Money for lettering."  He enrolled in a lettering class at the Connecticut League of Art Students and went on to take life drawing classes.  In 1926, Avery met Sally Michel, a successful illustrator and fellow artist.  Two years later they were married.  Through her illustrating assignments, Sally was able to support the fine art endeavors of herself as well as Avery.Modernist art-particularly that of the French artist Henri Matisse-had a tremendous influence on Avery's work.  In Adolescence, forms are simplified and flattened, creating a decorative effect, and the subtle variations of hue reveal Avery's mastery of color (it is this adroitness with color that would later influence Color Field artists such as Mark Rothko).  The painting depicts Avery's daughter March at the age of fifteen and was exhibited in 1947 at Durand-Ruel's gallery in New York.  This was Avery's first solo exhibition and, as his daughter was featured in all of the exhibited works, the show was aptly titled My Daughter, March.  Concerned with capturing the essence of adolescence, this painting expresses the universal through the particular and stands as a classic example of Avery's fully developed style.