s Alison Mason Kingsbury

Young Life

In 1898, Alison Mason Kingsbury (A. M. K.) was born in Durham, New Hampshire, to Albert Kingsbury, a mechanical engineer and thrust bearing innovator (Class of 1887), and Alison Mason, an amateur painter and former New York socialite. As a young woman, A. M. K. was sent by her parents to attend Wellesley, a small, academically rigorous, all-women's college in Massachusetts, where she studied art history and physics. She spent her summers working as a draftswoman for her father's Kingsbury Machine Works, an experience that she later reported sealed her determination to become an artist.

After graduation, A. M. K. moved to New York City, already the epicenter of American art as the swinging twenties were just beginning, and studied at the Art Students' League with such conservative instructors as George Bridgman, a methodical teacher of anatomy, and F. V. DuMond, an American Impressionist. For income, she designed greetings cards on the side, which were highly stylized graphic pieces that often hinted at her great humor.

By 1922, the ambitious A. M. K. was off again, this time for a grand European tour, a tradition of the young and affluent dating back to the eighteenth century. With the funds she saved from her graphic work in New York and backing from her father, she joined the École des Beaux-Arts at Fontainebleau in France, where she studied fresco with Paul Albert Baudouin and sculpture and mural composition with Alfred Janniot during one of the school's first terms. From there, she followed Janniot, whose round stylized forms and interest in classical allegory would stay with her for years, to the French School in Rome, where she continued her study of frescoes.

Alison Mason Kingsbury Sr. with daughters. Sepia toned gelatin silver print. [ca. 1910]
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This photograph of the Kingsbury women was taken around 1910, with Alison Mason Kingsbury in the center with her daughters flanking her. The artist, Alison Jr., is pictured furthest to the left.

From the collection of Alison and Richard Jolly

Alison Mason Kingsbury. Untitled pen sketch. [ca. 1915]
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Alison Mason Kingsbury grew up with the ambition to become a professional artist, while her female contemporaries were more concerned with marriage matches. Sketches from her childhood show a clear technical proficiency and a wry sense of humor.

Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections
Cornell University Library

Alison Mason Kingsbury. Geometry Composition Book. [ca. 1922]
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Originally her sister Elizabeth Brewster Kingsbury's geometry notebook, A. M. K. took it over as a sketchbook for her studies at the Art Students' League and filled it with anatomical sketches and portraits.

Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections
Cornell University Library

Alison Mason Kingsbury. Geometry Composition Book page. [ca. 1922]
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Sketches and notes from A. M. K.'s studies at the Art Students' League.

Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections
Cornell University Library

Alison Mason Kingsbury. Untitled greeting card design. [ca. 1920]
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While a student, A. M. K. earned a modest income by designing greeting cards on the side.

Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections
Cornell University Library

Alison Mason Kingsbury. New Years greeting card design. [ca. 1920]
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A New Year's greeting card design:

I wish for your New Year
A world full of treasures,

New friends and successes,

A host of new pleasures.

But, I wish for your Christmas

The ancient Good Cheer

Which lasts, with our friendship,

Unchanging each year.

Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections
Cornell University Library

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