Charles Yardley Turner

Charles Yardley "C. Y." Turner (November 25, 1850 – January 1, 1919) was an American painter, illustrator, muralist and teacher. His genre scenes and American historical paintings were popularized through engravings and book illustrations.

Biography Turner was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the youngest son of lumber merchant John Comegys Turner (1816-1876) and Hanah Bartlett Turner (1817-1863). while studying drawing at the evening school of the Maryland Institute for the Promotion of the Mechanic Arts at night. He moved to New York City in 1872, where he worked as a colorist in a photographic studio during the day, He moved to Paris in 1878, where he studied under Jean-Paul Laurens, Mihály Munkácsy and Léon Bonnat. Among his NAD students were Zelma Baylos, Abraham Bogdanove, Mary Allison Doull, Harry Leith-Ross, Peter Béla Mayer, Frederick Ballard Williams and Arthur William Woelfle.

In 1912 he became director of his Baltimore alma mater, renamed the Maryland Institute School of Art and Design.

Muralist Turner painted his first murals in the early 1890s. His philosophy was that a mural should complement the architecture, not compete with it:When we come to mural painting the picture should neither project from the wall nor make a hole in it. The object must not be smothered, and the original form lost. When the decoration becomes more prominent than the object decorated, it is bad decoration. Such treatment would be as false as making the figures in a carpet stand up so prominently as to cause us to experience a sense of striking against them as we walk. Turner's 5-panel mural features Stewart at far left, in shirt sleeves having just set the fire, and a tableau of life-size figures in the foreground, set against a background of flames. It is in height and in length. The school relocated to The Bronx in 1929, and the murals were taken down and reinstalled in the library of the new building.

Awards and honors

The National Academy of Design awarded Turner the 1884 Second Hallgarten Prize (and $200 cash award) for The Courtship of Miles Standish, the first of his "Longfellow" paintings. He exhibited The Days That Are No More at the 1886 Paris Salon, and received an Honorable Mention. He exhibited eleven oil paintings at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition—including The Grand Canal, Dordrecht, The Days That Are No More, and The Courtship of Miles Standish—and was awarded a Medal for Excellence. The Architectural League of New York awarded Turner its 1912 Medal of Honor for Painting, for his mural General Washington at Fort Lee, at the Hudson County Courthouse in Jersey City, New Jersey.

The National Academy of Design elected Turner an Associate in 1883, He was a member of the American Water Color Society and the Society of American Etchers. He was a member of the Architectural League of New York, and served as its vice-president. and served as its president, 1883–1889. and painted a group portrait of more than forty of its members—A Saturday Evening at the Century (1894)—that included a cameo of himself.

Personal Turner never married. He preferred to be called "C. Y.," because, he said, his initials "made a combination that really had more individuality than 'Charles Yardley'."

He contracted Spanish flu, and died of pneumonia at Presbyterian Hospital, New York City, prior to dawn on January 1, 1919. The 3-part mural encircled the hotel's Rotunda. The Gods of Greece, 1898, Lobby The Four Seasons, 1900-1901 The Days, 1900-1901 Astor Dining Room frieze and spandrels, Astoria Hotel, New York City, 1897, demolished 1929. Ceiling mural, National Bank of Commerce, 31 Nassau Street, Manhattan, New York City, 1897, demolished 1966 History of the Island of Martinique, Hotel Martinque, 32nd Street and Broadway, New York City, 1898, 4 lunette murals Appellate Division Courthouse of New York State, Manhattan, New York City, 1899 Law Equity "Sir Walter Raleigh" murals, Raleigh Hotel, Washington, D.C., Lobby, 1899-1900 The Destruction of the Spanish Fleet—1588, Lobby, 1899-1900 Rathskeller mural: 9 panels, 1899-1900 Baltimore Court House, Baltimore, Maryland Barter with the Indians for Land in Southern Maryland, 1634, 1901-1902 The Burning of the "Peggy Stewart", 1903 Interior decoration, New York Chamber of Commerce Building, 65 Liberty Street, Manhattan, New York City, 1903 Entering the Mohawk Valley, X Marriage of the Waters, X The school relocated from Manhattan to The Bronx in 1929. The murals were taken down and installed in the library of the new building. Essex County Court House, Newark, New Jersey, 1906 Landing of the Milfordites at New England, May 17, 1666 The Great Prophets, St. Andrew's Methodist Episcopal Church, 120 West 76th Street, Manhattan, New York City, 1906, 4 pendentive murals. Church interior The building is now West Side Institutional Synagogue, and the murals are hidden above a drop ceiling. Rotunda murals, Hudson County Courthouse, Jersey City, New Jersey, 1910 General Washington at Fort Lee, November 16, 1776 The First Passage of the Steamer Clermont to Albany, 1807, First Trial by Law, Mahoning County, Mahoning County Courthouse, Youngstown, Ohio, 1911 Three of Turner's preparatory sketches, portraits of Native Americans, were his 1919 bequest to Youngstown's Butler Institute of American Art. A fourth Turner preparatory sketch was a 1961 gift to the Institute. Court of Appeals Court Room, Cuyahoga County Courthouse, Cleveland, Ohio, 1912 The Conclave of Pontiac and Rogers’ Rangers at the Cuyahoga River, November 1760, X The Trial of Captain John Smith at Jamestown, June 10, 1607, X "History of Transportation in Wisconsin" murals, North Hearing Room, Wisconsin State Capitol, 1917 Indians with Horses Trappers in Canoes Stage Coach Steam and Motor

Paintings

The Grand Canal, Dordrecht, 1881. Exhibited at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Honorable Mention at the 1889 Exposition Universelle. Exhibited at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Deaccessioned from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1956. John Alden's Letter, Union League Club, Chicago, 1888. Exhibited at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. The Pride of the Farm, 1890. Exhibited at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Deaccessioned from the DeYoung Memorial Museum, 2010. A Saturday Evening at the Century, Century Association, Manhattan, New York City, 1894. Depicts 40+ members of the Century Association (including a cameo of Turner) in conversation at the club. Chrysanthemums, 1907. Deaccessioned from Brooklyn Museum of Art Moved by the Spirit: Margaretta Walton Preaching, Stony Run Friends Meeting, Baltimore, Maryland, 1907. Molly Pitcher at the Battle of Monmouth, 1907 Portrait of Walter Shirlaw, 1908. Turner had studied under Shirlaw at the Art Students League of New York.