Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (January 9, 1875 – April 18, 1942) was an American sculptor, art patron and collector, and founder in 1931 of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. She was a prominent social figure and hostess, who was born into the wealthy Vanderbilt family and married into the Whitney family.

Early life

thumb|left|150px|Gertrude, 13 years of age. ([[John Everett Millais, 1888)]]

Gertrude Vanderbilt was born on January 9, 1875, in New York City, the second daughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt II (1843–1899) and Alice Claypoole Gwynne (1852–1934), and a great-granddaughter of "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt. Her older sister died before Gertrude was born, but she grew up with several brothers and a younger sister. also known as 1 West 57th Street. As a young girl, Gertrude spent her summers in Newport, Rhode Island, at the family's summer home, The Breakers, where she kept up with the boys in all their rigorous sporting activities. She was educated by private tutors and at the exclusive Brearley School for women students in New York City.

Education and early work

right|thumb | Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney in her studio,

While visiting Europe in the early 1900s, Gertrude Whitney discovered the burgeoning art world of Montmartre and Montparnasse in France. What she saw encouraged her to pursue her creativity and become a sculptor.

She studied at the Art Students League of New York with Hendrik Christian Andersen and James Earle Fraser. In Paris she studied with Andrew O'Connor and also received criticism from Auguste Rodin. Her training with sculptors of public monuments influenced her later direction. she is best known today for her monumental works.

thumb|left|Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, II and her daughters, Gladys and Gertrude, having tea in the library at the Breakers Newport, Rhode Island, [[William Bruce Ellis Ranken, 1932]]

Her first public commission was Aspiration, a life-size male nude in plaster, which appeared outside the New York State Building at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, in 1901.

Initially she worked under an assumed name, fearing that she would be portrayed as a socialite and her work not taken seriously. Neither her family nor (after her marriage) her husband were supportive of her desire to work seriously as an artist. She once told an artist friend, "Never expect Harry to take your work seriously ... It never has made any difference to him that I feel as I do about art and it never will (except as a source of annoyance)." She believed that a man would have been taken more seriously as an artist, and that her wealth put her in a lose-lose situation: criticized if she took commissions because other artists were more needy, but blamed for undercutting the market for other artists if she was not paid. She also set up a studio in Passy, a fashionable Parisian neighborhood in the XVI arrondissement.

By 1910, she was exhibiting her work publicly under her own name. Spanish Peasant was accepted at the Paris Salon in 1911, and Aztec Fountain was awarded a bronze medal in 1915 at the San Francisco Exhibition. The first charity exhibition she organized was in 1914 called the 50-50 Art Sale.

World War I and its aftermath

During World War I, Gertrude Whitney dedicated a great deal of her time and money to various relief efforts, establishing and maintaining a fully operational hospital for wounded soldiers in Juilly, about northwest of Paris in France. Her work prior to the war had a much less realistic style, which she strayed away from to give the work a more serious feeling. but her smaller works were not seen as particularly significant during her lifetime. Since her death critics have recognized the expert craftsmanship of her smaller works.

  • Washington Heights-Inwood War Memorial – Mitchell Square Park, Washington Heights, New York City, erected 1922
  • Buffalo Bill - The Scout, William F. Cody Memorial – Cody, Wyoming, dedicated 1924
  • Untermyer Memorial, Woodlawn Cemetery, New York City, 1925
  • The Founders of the Daughters of the American Revolution, a memorial honoring the four founders – Constitution Hall, Washington, D.C., dedicated 1929; Whitney was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
  • Titanic Memorial – Washington, D.C., unveiled 1931
  • Peter Stuyvesant Monument, New York City, 1936–1939
  • To the Morrow, vt. Wings, vt. Spirit of Flight,

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">

File:'War Panel for the Victory Arch' by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, Wolfsonian-FIU Museum I.JPG|Victory Arch, one of two bronze reliefs, New York City

File:Mitchel Square World War I memorial.jpg | Washington Heights-Inwood War Memorial (World War I), New York City

File:Titanic Memorial (Washington, D.C.).jpg | Titanic Memorial, Washington, D.C.

File:The Scout by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney.jpg | Buffalo Bill - The Scout, Cody, Wyoming

File:Monumento a Cristobal Colón, Huelva..JPG | Monument to Columbus, Huelva, Spain

File:The Three Graces - 1931 - Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney - 06.jpg | The Three Graces, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

File:Founders of the Daughters of the American Revolution cropped.JPG | The Founders of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Washington, D.C.

File:St-nazaire monument au mort americain.JPG |American Expeditionary Forces Memorial, Saint-Nazaire, France

File:Stuyvesant Square Peter Styvesant statue.jpg | Peter Stuyvesant, New York City

File:Patio and central fountain, Pan American Union.jpg | Aztec fountain, Pan American Union Building, Washington, D.C.

File:Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney Fountain of El Dorado 1915 Zenis Newton.jpg | Fountain of El Dorado, detail, 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition

</gallery>

Whitney's Titanic Memorial is considered by critics as the most important achievement in her artistic career. The statue was built from a $50,000 prize from a competition that she won in 1914. The Government of France purchased a marble replica of the head of the Titanic Memorial, which is now housed in the Musée du Luxembourg.

Whitney sculpted the Christopher Columbus memorial, the Monument to Columbus (also known as "Monument to the Discovery Faith"), in Huelva, Spain (1928–1933). With a cubist style, it is one of her biggest works.

In 1931 Whitney presented the Caryatid Fountain to McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The fountain is also referred to as The Good Will Fountain, The Friendship Fountain, The Whitney Fountain, The Three Graces and, because it consists of three nude males, The Three Bares. There is also a bronze version of this fountain in Washington Square in Lima, Peru.

Influence in art

thumb|[[Robert Henri, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, 1916]]

thumb|Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, in [[Vogue (magazine)|Vogue magazine, by Adolf de Meyer, January 15, 1917]]

Her great wealth afforded her the opportunity to become a patron of the arts, but she also devoted herself to the advancement of women in art, supporting and exhibiting in women-only shows and ensuring that women were included in mixed shows. She supported exhibition of artwork both locally and around the country, including the 1913 Armory Show in New York. Whitney also donated money to the Society of Independent Artists founded in 1917, which aimed to promote artists who deviated from academic norms.

By 1908, Whitney had opened the Whitney Studio Gallery in the same buildings as her own studio on West Eighth Street in Greenwich Village. Artists such as Robert Henri and Jo Davidson were invited to showcase their works there. In 1914, Gertrude Whitney also established the Whitney Studio Club at 147 West 4th Street, as an artists' club where young artists could meet and talk, as well as exhibit their works. Thus, the club expanded both in size and scope of programming. These early galleries would evolve to become Whitney's greatest legacy, the Whitney Museum of American Art, on the site of what is now the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture.

In 1929, Whitney offered the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art the donation of her twenty-five-year collection of nearly 700 American modern art works and full payment for building a wing to accommodate these works.</blockquote>

Her Greenwich Village studio has been named a National Treasure by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, giving it landmark status.

When Whitney died in 1942, the Whitney Museum of American Art was cleared of the debt it owed her and granted $2.5&nbsp;million of her money. Gertrude considered it one of the "thrills of my life, when Esther kissed me," and her mother, Alice, was so concerned about the friendship that she forbade Gertrude to see Esther. The separation seemed to have worked; for while Esther continued to write heartbroken letters of longing, Gertrude went on to have a bevy of male beaux.

At age 21, on August 25, 1896, she married the extremely wealthy sportsman Harry Payne Whitney (1872–1930). A banker and investor, Whitney was the son of politician William Collins Whitney and Flora Payne, the daughter of former U.S. Senator from Ohio Henry B. Payne, and sister to a Standard Oil Company magnate. Harry Whitney inherited a fortune in oil and tobacco as well as interests in banking. They also had a country estate in Old Westbury, Long Island.

Harry Whitney died of pneumonia in 1930, at age 58, leaving an estate valued at approximately $72&nbsp;million. The bulk of the fortune was left in Trust for their three children; Gertrude received a life interest in their Manhattan townhouse at 871 Fifth Avenue.

In 1934, she was at the center of a highly publicized court battle with her brother Reginald's widow, Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt, for custody of her ten-year-old niece, Gloria Vanderbilt. Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney did win custody of her niece at the end of the custody battle. The reported cause of her death was from a heart condition.

Wealth

Inheritance

Following the death of Gertrude's father Cornelius Vanderbilt II in 1899, she inherited a quarter-share of a $20,000,000 trust fund along with her siblings Alfred, Reginald and Gladys, from which she would enjoy a life interest in the trust's income. She also received $1,125,000 outright from a $5,000,000 Trust fund which her grandfather William H. Vanderbilt I had provided her father in his will; Alfred, Reginald and Gladys also each received $1,125,000 outright from this trust, whilst their elder brother Cornelius Vanderbilt III's share of this trust was $500,000. As a mark of special affection, Gertrude's father also made an additional provision in his will bequeathing $1,000,000 outright to Gertrude.

Estate

Following her death, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney's will was submitted for probate to the Surrogate's Court of New York County in May 1942. Although contemporary newspapers estimated the value of her estate at $25 to $50 million, an interim accounting of her estate submitted to the court by her executors in 1943 put the value of the estate at $10,590,492.

The majority of Gertrude's estate was left to charity and her three children; bequests in her will included:

  • $2,500,000 outright to the Whitney Museum;

Awards and honors

  • Medal of Award at Panama-Pacific Exhibition for Fountain of El Dorado, 1915
  • Medal of Honor of the National Sculpture Society, 1940

In the 1982 television miniseries Little Gloria... Happy at Last, Whitney was portrayed by actress Angela Lansbury, who earned an Emmy nomination for her performance.

In 1999, Gertrude Whitney's granddaughter, Flora Miller Biddle, published a family memoir entitled The Whitney Women and the Museum They Made. She was also the subject of B. H. Friedman's 1978 Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney: A Biography.

References