Lilla Cabot Perry

Lilla Cabot Perry was an American artist who worked in the American Impressionist style, rendering portraits and landscapes in the free form manner of her mentor, Claude Monet. Perry was an early advocate of the French Impressionist style and contributed to its reception in the United States. Perrys early work was shaped by her exposure to the Boston School of artists and her travels in Europe and Japan. She was also greatly influenced by Ralph Waldo Emersons philosophies and her friendship with Camille Pissarro. Although it was not until the age of thirtysix that Perry received formal training, her work with artists of the Impressionist, Realist, Symbolist, and German Social Realist movements greatly affected the style of her oeuvre.

Lydia Cabot was born January 13, 1848 in Boston, Massachusetts. Her father was Dr. Samuel Cabot III, a distinguished surgeon. Her mother was Hannah Lowell Jackson Cabot. She was the eldest of eight children, three being, Samuel Cabot IV , chemist and founder of Valspars Cabot Stains, Dr. Arthur Tracy Cabot , a progressive surgeon, and Godfrey Lowell Cabot , founder of Cabot Corporation. Her family was prominent in Boston society, and friends of the family included Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and James Russell Lowell, who was her mothers cousin who respected Lillas independent spirit, scorn of ignoble things, and alert nature. Lowells daughter and Lillas cousin, Mabel, was a close companion. Perry recalled having the opportunity to play the game fox and geese with both Emerson and Alcott. She had lending privileges at the Boston Athenum, through her father, who was a proprieter, and her mothers family.

Source: Wikipedia