"Mrs. Philip Hale (Lillian Westcott Hale)"
Mrs. Philip Hale (Lilian Westcott Hale) was donated to Wheaton College in 1950 by Mrs. Marion Lolthrop (Class of 1907). Created by the famous gilded age American portraitist, William Merritt Chase between 1902 and 1914. The painting depicts Lillian Westcott Hale, a well established Boston artist, in a 3/4 pose looking down at the palette and brushes she is holding in her hands. The portrait is also known as Lady in Black, Portrait of Mrs. Philip Hale, or Mrs. Lilian Westcott Hale.
The story of Mrs. Hale, then Ms. Lilian Westcott, begins during Chase’s visit to Mrs. Hale’s art classes at the Hartford Art School in 1897. Chase spotted her talent and suggested that the 18 year-old and unmarried Lillian Westcott study under his tutelage in New York. In letters cited by biographer Erica Hirshler, Chase pleads with Mrs. Hale’s mother, “Your daughter has decided talent. I would advise, by all means, that you help and encourage—in every way that you possibly can—the efforts made on her part…”[1] Her Mother and teachers advised her against studying under Chase because of the scandal that could be caused by a young unmarried women studying unaccompanied under a man[2]. There was also an idea circulating with the rise of women as artists that women needed to remain single and live by a strict moral code to make quality art, this would chance thought her career which extended into 1960, but in 1899 it was a scandal when Mrs. Hale received Chase’s scholarship at attended his progressive, open-air art school in Shinnecock, Long Island [3]. In spite of this Mrs. Hale received a scholarship from Chase to attend his summer outdoor school in Long Island for the summer of 1899.
After the summer of 1899, Chase continued to occupy a studio in New York, while Lillian continued her studies at the School of Fine Arts in Boston. In 1902 Lillian became Mrs. Philip Hale as she married fellow Boston artist and teacher Philip Leslie Hale. The two lived together in Dedham and shared a studio in Boston. The story of Chase’s Lilian Westcott Hale is more complicated.
Text Sources:
[1] William Mettitt Chase to Harriet Westcott, March 14th, 1898, Box 53a, Folder 1444, Hale Papers, SSC in Erica Eve Hirshler, “Lilian Westcott Hale (1880-1963): a Woman Painter of the Boston School.”
[2] Erica Eve Hirshler, “Lilian Westcott Hale (1880-1963): a Woman Painter of the Boston School.”
[3] Ibid