Idlers

David Walling Humphrey

Early 20th century Romantic monotypist David Walling Humphrey experimented with the technique at the Art Institute of Chicago in the early 1890s where he undoubtedly became familiar with the monotypes of Maurice Prendergast and others of "The Eight".

Like Prendergast, Humphrey traveled to Paris in the late 1890s and studied art at the Acadamie Julian and with J.A.M. Whistler, where he became interested in the Pre-Raphaelites and Symbolists, bringing this imagery back with him to America when he returned. Humphrey did most of his work around Darien, Connecticut and was associated with the Silvermine art colony in New Canaan, CT. One of his monotypes was included in Joann Moser's catalogue "Singular Impressions - The Monotype in America", page 130, figure 138.

Moser notes, on page 129: "'A published description of his monotypes in 1931 applies to his earliest monotypes as well: 'misty, gray-green trees; graceful figures in diaphanous robes...fascinating satyrs, leering behind gray lichen-draped rocks - a world poetic in its conception, - a visualization of Debussy's 'A l'apres midi d'un faune.'''