Portrait of Honoré Willsie Morrow
1917
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
1917
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Portrait of Honoré Willsie Morrow is a 1917 by Gertrude Käsebier, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see a woman in a dark dress, her face lit softly from the side. Her gaze is steady, almost challenging. This isn’t just a polite portrait. The photographer (yes, Käsebier was a photographer) caught something sharp in the sitter’s eyes—Honoré Willsie Morrow, a writer and editor. The framing is tight, almost like a snapshot, which was unusual for formal portraits at the time. To see more of this quiet intensity, look up other portraits by Gertrude Käsebier (American, 1852–1934).
This bust-length portrait of Honoré Willsie Morrow demonstrates how Käsebier brought an artistic attitude to even straightforward commercial portrait commissions. Morrow (1880–1940) was a successful author of fiction and nonfiction and a magazine editor. Käsebier’s portrait, while appropriately demure, nonetheless conveys the sitter’s intelligence, energy, and directness, enlivening a formulaic composition through pose, framing, and highlighting.
Gertrude Käsebier was one of the most revered artistic portraitists of her day.
Read the full account in the museum source.
Gertrude Käsebier (1852–1934) was an American artist.
See the richer artist page
