""In The Reading-Room" for the article "Old New York Taverns""   Lot no. 3105

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Illustration for the article ”Old New York Taverns” by John Austin Stevens for Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, published May 1890, Page 849.

The article explores the significant role of taverns in New Amsterdam, modern-day New York City.

 Howard Pyle’s en grisaille illustration depicts a group of colonial-era men in New Amsterdam, engrossed in reading their newspapers in a communal room. The accompanying text emphasizes that coffee houses in the burgeoning, trade-focused city served as the primary daytime gathering spots for merchants. These establishments also provided a quiet evening retreat for colonists to read newspapers arriving from abroad, thus connecting them to global events.

Equally vital to the city’s social fabric were its taverns. Much like the coffee houses, taverns functioned as central gathering places, frequently hosting the community’s leading figures and playing a significant role in the social life of New Amsterdam.

Explore related art collections: Brandywine School / Newly Researched / Historical / 1800s / $50,000-$100,000 / Black & White / Magazine Stories

See all original artwork by Howard Pyle

ABOUT THE ARTIST

 

Howard Pyle has long been considered ‘The Father of American Illustration’. In the 1890’s, Pyle was well established as an illustrator and turned his mind to teaching others. In 1894 he published 99 illustrations bringing in substantial fees while teaching at the school of his creation for free. Pyle’s school for illustration in Wilmington allowed the city to become the center of the illustration in the late 19^th century. Many of his students became extraordinarily well talented and well-known illustrators. He began illustrating for magazines such as Century Magazine, Harpers weekly, cosmopolitaon, and Ladies home journal. Each Illustration was received enthusiastically be the magazine art editors and their readership causing him to be in demand from the very beginning of his career. He was a master of all art forms of media from pen and ink to watercolors, oils pencil and charcoal.

He had the goal that while teaching he would train a generation to visually define his nation for itself through illustration. He could capture the feeling from any time in history and turn historic figures into flesh and blood and was considered the best illustrator in his day. He was born during the most propitious time for an illustrator of his magnitude. During his career, Howard Pyle produced illustrations for nearly three-thousand five hundred publications, and about half of those images illustrated books and articles he authored – two hundred magazine articles and nineteen books.