Charles Francis Browne, “The Old Garden, Santiago,” Oil on Canvas, 1910

Painting

A central, linear pathway leads through a garden to a pink stucco building with terra-cotta tiles on the roof. Small trees and pink and white flowering shrubs line the cobbled path. A slightly larger tree shades the building. A large round pot (likely terra-cotta) sits in front of the building, just to the right of the tree. About half-way up the path on the right there is a wooden garden bench with a back. Warm reds throughout the scene compliment the greens used to depict the surrounding flora. This painting was part of a tribute exhibition of Charles Francis Browne work that was held at the Art Institute from December 16, 1919 – January 20, 1920. Browne had suffered a stroke in May of 1919. The show was organized by his friends—including several with Eagle’s Nest ties—to raise money for the ailing artist.

30 x 35″

(1859-1920)

One of the original members of the Eagle’s Nest Art Colony, Browne was its premier landscape artist. Browne studied at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and then was a student of Thomas Eakins at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Afterward, he pursued further studies in Paris. In 1890 he moved to Chicago. There, he taught painting and lectured on art history at the Art Institue. Browne served as president of the Chicago Society of Artists and director of the Western Society of Artists.

Browne was married to one of Lorado Taft’s sisters and was the father of the child born at the Eagle’s Nest Art Colony. The couple divorced in 1908. During the summer of 1919, while at the Eagle’s Nest Camp, Browne was stricken with paralysis. He spent the autumn near Chicago, then went back to his mother’s home in Waltham, Massachusetts, where he died the following March.

Another one of his Ogle County landscapes, “Moonlight, Oregon, Illinois,” belongs to the Union League Club of Chicago.