Happy Birthday, Maxfield Parrish

Born in 1870 in Philadelphia, Maxfield Parrish first had ambition to be an architect. He built a career in commercial art after Harper’s Bazaar purchased an illustration of his for a magazine cover. In 1897, Parrish was chosen to illustrate “Mother Goose in Prose,” the first piece by L. Frank Baum, who later authored “The Wizard of Oz.”

Parrish first started drawing for personal amusement, and moved on to develop a truly original—and quite popular—artistic style. In fact, he was the most popular American artist from the beginning of the 20th century until Normal Rockwell emerged in the 1940s. Acknowledging Parrish’s abilities, Rockwell said, Parrish “was in the Golden Age of Illustration. When I was in art school I admired him. He was one of my gods.”

One of Parrish’s most notable works is his “Old King Cole” mural, which hangs in New York City’s St. Regis Hotel. “This painting launched [Parrish’s] career,” said Eric P. Widing, head of the American paintings department at Christie’s auction house. It was commissioned for John Jacob Astor IV, to decorate the Knickerbocker Hotel. When the Knickerbocker was converted into office space, the painting was placed in the St. Regis. Parrish, who had a Quaker upbringing, was hesitant to complete the painting because it was meant for a bar. Interestingly, the St. Regis’s King Cole Bar took its name from the painting.

One of the “most important Maxfield Parrish paintings still in private hands” is “Circe’s Palace.” Parrish created the piece to illustrate a reprint of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “A Wonder Book and Tanglewood Tales.” The painting is one of the earliest to showcase Parrish’s signature color, “Parrish blue.”

View images of Maxfield Parrish’s work at the Maxfield Parrish Online Gallery.

Additional Parrish illustrations are available at the Children’s Book Illustrators and Illustrations Gallery.

The luminous aspect of Parrish’s work was achieved by applying alternating layers of thin, transparent oil and varnish. The technique gave the illusion of looking through a window, and made Parrish’s work highly detailed. Completing a painting took a long time with this technique, but Parrish still accomplished a great deal, including children’s books and calendar landscapes.

Even though Parrish is known for his powerful use of color and extreme detail in his work, his early drawings were in black and white. He illustrated such books as “The Walls Were As of Jasper” and “Knickerbocker’s History of New York.” In 1982, his early works were printed in “The Black and White Parrish."

Maxfield Parrish was married to an art instructor named Lydia for 58 years, and had a companion/mistress named Susan Lewin for more than 55 years. Lewin, who lived with Parrish in his New Hampshire estate, was featured in many of his works. When Lydia died and Parrish didn’t marry Lewin, she married a childhood friend instead. Parrish was 90 years old and still painting at the time, but when he heard of Lewin’s nuptials, he never painted again. He died in 1966.