A Handbook of Christian Symbols and Stories of the Saints As Illustrated in Art

Clara Erskine Clement

Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1886

[Interesting provenance, previously owned by artist Frederic Crowninshield.] Bound in publisher's cloth. Gilt lettering. Hardcover. Good binding and cover. Shelf wear. Gutter starting. Stamp of Crowninshield on front end and title pages. Contemporary signature of Crowninshield on half title page. ix, 349 p., plates, 21 cm. 

A painter, illustrator, teacher, craftsperson and writer, who had studios in New York City and Stockbridge, Massachusetts, Frederic Crowninshield had specialties of mural decoration, stained glass, easel painting and teaching. As a young man, his schooling included Boston Latin School and Harvard College, from which he graduated in 1866. Within the next two years, he married short-story writer, Helen Fairbanks, studied briefly with William Rimmer, and left for Europe, where he stayed for more than a decade. He served in Rome, Italy as Director of the American Academy, Rome from 1909-1911. He was a teacher at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts from 1879 to 1885, and also was an author whose books included Mural Painting.