John Warner Norton (7 March 1876 - 7 January 1934) was an Illinois muralist and easel artist who pioneered the field in the United States.
Norton was born in Lockport, Illinois, the son of John Lyman Norton and Ada Clara Gooding Norton. The family ran the Norton & Co. of Lockport. Norton's study of law at Harvard University was broken off when the family's firm went bankrupt. Before, and after a period of living as a cowboy and enlisting with the Rough Riders, he studied art at the Art Institute of Chicago (1897, 1899–1901); he would later teach there. He was influenced by the Armory Show and the Japanese printmaker Katsushika Hokusai.
Among his works are the landmark 1929 180-foot (55 m) long ceiling mural for the concourse of the Chicago Daily News Building (not currently installed in this building, which has been renamed); the Ceres mural in the Chicago Board of Trade Building (1930); two large murals, "Old South" and "New South" commissioned by Holabird & Root for the Jefferson County Courthouse in Birmingham, Alabama; his Tavern Club (Chicago) murals; his American Heritage Series at the Hamilton Park Field House, 513 W. 72nd St., Chicago; four murals at the St. Paul, Minnesota city hall; twelve murals comprising The History of Mankind (1923) at the Logan Museum of Anthropology at Beloit College, in Wisconsin; and his first major mural in the Cliff Dwellers Club (1909), where he was a founding member.
At the time of his death in Charleston, South Carolina of cancer, he was a popular and respected artist.
Honors
William M. R. French memorial Gold Medal (1924)
Norman Waite Harris Bronze Medal (1926)
honorary Master of Fine Arts from the Art Institute of Chicago
Gold Medal of Honor for Mural Painting from the Architectural League of New York (1931)
References
Zimmer, John L. (2005–06) "Memories of John W. Norton's Mural Masterpiece," The Living Museum 67(4): 4-8.
Gray, Mary Lackritz (2001) A Guide to Chicago's Murals. University Of Chicago Press.
Tallmadge, Thomas and Tom Lea (1935) John W. Norton, American Painter. Lakeside Press: Chicago (privately printed).
John Warner Norton (catalogue raisonné). Illinois State Museum.
External links
Works by John W. Norton at Project Gutenberg
Works by or about John W. Norton at Internet Archive
A discussion of the mounting of Ceres: http://aic.stanford.edu/jaic/articles/jaic24-01-002.html
(JAIC 1984, Volume 24, Number 1, Article 2 (pp. 14 to 22) )
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