A Rising Canadian Artist
The Western Call newspaper, article by Editor
Vancouver, June 23, 1911
Miss Marguerite Frechette, the Canadian
girl, who has been studying
art in Paris for the past two years, and who has had the honor
conferred upon her of election to the Union International des Beaux
Arts et des Lettres, is a niece of the late lamented Dr. Louis H.
Frechette, the well-known Canadian author and poet and laurate (sic)
of the French Academy. Her father, Mr. Achille Frechette, chief of the
translation branch of the House of Commons, at Ottawa, before entering
the public service, had made a reputation for himself as a journalist
and lawyer, and he has also won recognition as "an artist of admirable
skill." For eighteen years he has been director and for five years
secretary of the Art Association of Ottawa. Her mother was the daughter
of the Hon. W.H. Howells, formely United States consul at Quebec and
later at Toronto. William Dean Howells, the celebrated United States
novelist, was a brother of Madame Frechette, and she also has
distinguished herself as a writer of short stories and sketches of
travel. She for a time occupied the position of literary editor of the
Chicago Inter-Ocean and has written two novels, which found general
acceptance, "Reuben Dale" and "On Grandmother's Farm." For a long period
Mrs. Frechette has held the office of secretary of the Ottawa branch
of the National Council of Women.
While yet a child Miss Frechette began her studies in art in Ottawa under
the direction of Mr. Franklyn Brownell, going later to Montreal, where
she worked under Mr. William Brymner. Afterwards she went to New York,
and studied there for several years, returning to Ottawa each spring to
spend the summer with her parents. In Paris, Miss Frechette is studying
under such well-known masters as Lucien Simon and Rene Menard, and has
been specially under the tuition of Madame Leforges, the famous woman
artist. The young artist has made a specialty of portraiture, marine
scenes and various other studies. One of her pictures was hung last
year at the Salon, and she is working on another, "A Woman's Head,"
which she hopes to have accepted for the Salon this spring. The model
of this is a French-Canadian girl of characteristic brunette type.
Several of this talented young Canadian artist's pictures are familiar to
Canadians who have visited Quebec of recent years, as they hang
conspicuously in the dining room of the Chateau Frontenac. The subjects
are the bygone hearoes (sic) of early Canada, Jacques Cartier, Laval,
Frontenac, Montcalm, Wolfe and De Levis.
Article provided courtesy Jason Vanderhill
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