"These pictures suggest a moment's consideration of the true meaning of the term 'style' as applied to painting. Is it not more than the mere ableness of method, still more than the audacity of brush work, that often passes for style? Is it possible to dissociate the manner of a picture from its embodiment of some fact or idea? For it to have style in the full sense of the word, surely it must embody an expression of life as serious and thorough as the method of record."—Charles H. Caffin.
In the International Studio of March, 1903, we read: "The portrait of Mrs. Roosevelt, by Miss Cecilia Beaux, seemed to me to be one of the happiest of her creations. Nothing could exceed the skill and daintiness with which the costume is painted, and the characterization of the head is more sympathetic than usual, offering a most winsome type of beautiful, good womanhood. A little child has been added to the picture—an afterthought, I understand, and scarcely a fortunate one; at least in the manner of its presentment. The figure is cleverly merged in half shadow, but the treatment of the face is brusque, and a most unpleasant smirk distorts the child's mouth. It is the portrait of the mother that carries the picture, and its superiority to many of Miss Beaux's portraits consists in the sympathy with her subject which the painter has displayed."—Charles H. Caffin.
A writer in the Mail and Express says: "Miss Beaux has approached the task of painting the society woman of to-day, not as one to whom this type is known only by the exterior, but with a sympathy as complete as a similar tradition and an artistic temperament will allow. Thus she starts with an advantage denied to all but a very few American portrait painters, and this explains the instinctive way in which she gives to her pictured subjects an air of natural ease and good breeding."
Miss Beaux's picture of "Brighton Cats" is so excellent that one almost regrets that she has not emulated Mme. Ronner's example and left portraits of humans to the many artists who cannot paint cats!
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Beck, Carol H. Mary Smith prize at Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1899. Fellow of above Academy and member of the Plastic Club, Philadelphia. Born in Philadelphia. Studied in schools of Pennsylvania Academy, and later in Dresden and Paris.
Miss Beck paints portraits and her works have been frequently exhibited. Her portraits are also seen in the University of Pennsylvania, in the Woman's Medical College, Philadelphia, in Wesleyan College, at the capitols of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and other public places, as well as in many private homes.
Miss Beck edited the Catalogue of the Wilstach Collection of Paintings in Memorial Hall, Fairmount Park, Philadelphia.
Beckington, Alice.
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