Author: CT State Library

Bellis, Daisy Maud (1887-?)Daisy Maud Bellis was born in Waltham, Massachusetts on February 16, 1887. She studied art at the Massachusetts School of Art, the University of Vermont, Breckenridge School of Painting, and in schools and studios in Montreal and Paris. In 1936 she was elected as a Fellow at the Royal Society of Arts in London. Bellis taught art at Salem College, Wins...

Bellin, Milton Rockwell (1913-1997)Milton Rockwell Bellin was born in New Haven, Connecticut on June 6, 1913. He attended the Yale School of Fine Arts and received his BACHELOR OF FINE ARTS in 1936. Bellin assisted James Daugherty with murals for the Stamford Housing Project and acknowledged Daugherty’s influence on his style. Bellin painted seven murals at Central Connecticut ...

Barbour, Harold (1889-1961)Harold Barbour was born in Newtonville, Massachusetts in 1889. He attended the Art Students League in New York City and worked in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1929 Barbour and his wife moved to Higganum, Connecticut and lived there until his death. He was active in the Central Connecticut Art Center in Marlborough. In addition to illustrations and cartoo...

Banever, Gilbert (1913-2003)Gilbert Banever was born in New Haven, Connecticut on June 8, 1913. He attended the city’s public schools, developed an interest in art, and won prizes and awards. He received a BACHELOR OF FINE ARTS from Yale in 1934. He supported himself by painting in the Yale University Library. That year Banever won the much sought after Prix de Rome which provi...

Backstrom, John W. (1899-1983)John Backstrom was born in Meriden, Connecticut and educated in public schools in Meriden and Wallingford. At the age of 14, he showed a talent for art that an art teacher noticed. That same year he sold his first painting. Backstrom continued to paint and developed his skill in landscape painting. During the Second World War he served in the Army....

Nothing is known about Austin Ayers except that he painted three oil easels for the WPA in 1941. Source:  WPA Artist’s Work Card.Works of Art Listed in CT Archives' database from Austin Ayers:Children's Concert-Woolsey Hall:oilSpring 2:30:oilOld House- Woodbridge:oilAyers, Austin

Angeletti, Nicholas (1900-1946)Nicholas Angeletti was born in Salandro, Italy on May 16, 1900. He came to Connecticut in 1901 and attended an evening high school for two years. He also worked in a factory and then sold meat. From 1919-1925 he studied art at the Connecticut Art Students League in Hartford, and he studied with Guy Wiggins, a prominent Lyme painter, for two summer...

 Albert, Ernest Maxwell (1890-1955)Ernest Maxwell Albert was born in Chicago, Illinois as the son of Ernest Albert (1857-1946). The elder achieved distinction for designing color schemes for the interiors of buildings at the 1895 Chicago World’s Fair. He worked as a set designer for the Chicago Opera House and then moved his family to New York. There he became the top Broadway ...

All that is known about Louis Agostini is that he worked for the predecessor to the WPA Federal Arts Project known as the Public Works Arts Program. He completed at least six paintings, most of them in 1936. His paintings were allocated to the Laurel Heights Sanatorium, the State Teacher’s College in New Haven, and Milford High School in Milford, Connecticut. The work at the hi...

Vincent (1898-1951) and Girard [Gerard] (1895-1962) RossiVincent and Girard Rossi were born to Pasquale and Margaret Famiigletti Rossi, the former in 1891 and the latter in 1895. Their father came to the United States in the 1920’s. He was a “well known barber in Waterbury” for 15 years and then moved to Thomaston, living there for twenty eight years. For 25 of the 28 years, he...