Benson, Frank W.

A native of Salem, Massachusetts, Frank Benson’s interest in art took him to Paris, where he studied at the famous Academie Julian amid the fervor of the Impressionist movement. On his return to the States, he rose to fame as a painter of sunlit portraits. Along with Childe Hassam, Benson became part of an influential group of American Impressionists known as The Ten. In 1900, Benson began to summer in Maine where, recalling youthful rambles in the woods and marshes near his home, he began to paint sporting watercolors and oils and to embark on a series of masterful etchings.