Guy Carleton Wiggins

Guy Carleton Wiggins (1883-1962)

Guy Carleton Wiggins (February 23, 1883 – April 25, 1962) was an American impressionist painter. He was the president of the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts, and a member of the Old Lyme Art Colony. He did many paintings of New York City's snowy streets, landmarks and towering skyscrapers during winter.

Wiggins was born on February 23, 1883 in Brooklyn. His father Carleton Wiggins was an accomplished artist who gave his son his first training as a painter. He attended the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, the Art Students League of New York, and the National Academy of Design. His teachers at the academy were William Merritt Chase and Robert Henri.

Wiggins often painted scenes of New York City, as evident in The Metropolitan Tower (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York); Washington Square in Winter (Richmond Art Museum, Indiana); Columbia Circle, Winter(National Gallery of Art, Washington); and Riverside Drive (1915).

Wiggins painted in an impressionistic style, as may be seen especially in Berkshire Hills, June (Brooklyn Museum). He traveled New England painting streams, fields and woodlands capturing on canvas the various seasons of the year. He became one of the youngest members of the Old Lyme Art Colony of Old Lyme, Connecticut, and painted alongside his father, Carleton, Childe Hassam, and Frank Vincent DuMond. Wiggins began teaching art in Essex, Connecticut in 1937. He did a portrait of President Dwight D. Eisenhowerand gave it to the White House in 1959.

Wiggins served as the president of the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts. He was a member of the National Academy of Design, the New Haven Paint and Clay Club, and the Lyme Art Association. He won the Flagg Prize, the Cooper Prize and the Atheneum Prize from the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts; the Harris Medal from the Art Institute of Chicago; the Turnbull Prize and the Isidor Prize from the Salmagundi Club; and the J. Francis Murphy Memorial Prize from the Rhode Island School of Design.

Wiggins married Dolores Gaxton. They had two sons, Carleton Wiggins and Guy Arthur Wiggins, and a daughter, Dorothy Gibson. Wiggins resided in Old Lyme, Connecticut and wintered in St. Augustine, Florida.

Wiggins died in 1962 while on vacation in St. Augustine, Florida, aged 80. His body was returned home to Connecticut and he was buried in Lyme. His work can be seen in several major museums, including the Art Institute of Chicago, Brooklyn Museum, and Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Wiggins's son, Guy Arthur Wiggins, is also a painter.