Edwin White

Who was Edwin White?

Edwin White was an American painter who studied in Paris, Düsseldorf, Rome, and Florence and later taught at the National Academy of Design, in New York. In addition to his studies under several different American and European painting masters, he also attended lectures at a Medical College in New York City to study anatomy. He also attended Amherst; where he received an A.M. by the end of l856.

Works by White, mostly in storage, are in the collections of Yale; The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; New-York Historical Society.

A notable moment in White's career was noted in October, 1855, when he met the painter Sanford Robinson Gifford in Paris and told Gifford that he was about to return to New York, was destitute, had no commissions, and might have to return to portrait painting. However, when White did return to his NY studio, he went to work on his Mayflower painting, which he sold off the easel for $1,000, and a new and successful stage of his career was launched. His painting of Washington resigning was painted on commission by the state of Maryland, for $6,000, when White had returned to Paris.