Clara Hagarty facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Clara Sophia Hagarty
Born	1871 (1871) Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Died	1958 (aged 86–87) Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Known for	Floral painter
Elected	Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (1904)

Clara Sophia Hagarty (1871–1958) was a talented Canadian artist. She loved to paint, especially using paints and pastels. She is best known for her beautiful paintings of flowers.

Clara was chosen to be part of important art groups. She joined the Ontario Society of Artists in 1903. The next year, in 1904, she became a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. She studied art in different places, including New Jersey, Paris, and the Netherlands.

During World War I, Clara worked for the Red Cross in London. After the war, she worked at the Art Gallery of Toronto until 1928. She passed away in Toronto, Ontario, in 1958.

Clara's Early Life

Clara Hagarty was born in Toronto. Her grandfather was Sir John Hawkins Hagarty, who was a very important judge in Ontario.

Clara grew up in her family's large home. It was called a "little English Mansion." The house had lovely elm trees and big green lawns. Clara spent a lot of time playing tennis there.

Learning to Be an Artist

Clara Hagarty started her art lessons in Toronto. She learned from two teachers, Sydney Strickland Tully and Edmund Wyly Grier.

After studying in Toronto, Clara went to New York. She joined sketching classes at the Chase School. Today, this school is known as Parsons The New School for Design.

Clara then traveled to Europe to continue her art studies. She learned in France, Italy, and the Netherlands. While in Paris, she was taught by famous artists like Frederick William MacMonnies and Claudio Castelucho.

Her First Artworks

When Clara Hagarty first started painting, she focused on portraits. These are paintings of people. She also painted interiors, which are pictures of the inside of buildings.

Some of her early paintings were shown to the public. They were part of an exhibition called the Pan-American Exposition. This show took place in Buffalo in 1901.

Showing Her Art

Clara Hagarty had many exhibitions where she showed her art. She displayed her pastel drawings and sketches. These works were inspired by her travels to Italy, the Dolomites (a mountain range), and Scotland.

Her art was shown at the T. Eaton Fine Art Galleries in Toronto. People said her work had a "lovely delicacy." They also noticed how skilled she was at using "gradation of color." This means she was very good at blending colors smoothly.

Some of the artworks shown included:

• St. Peter's, Sunset
• "Clover Fields, Cortina"
• The Alhambra, Spring
• "Wisteria, Varenna"
• "A Bridge"
• "Field Flowers, Cortina"
• "Cypress Trees and Olives"
• "Edinburgh Mist"

Clara had about 85 sketches in this exhibition. She created these pieces after her trips to Europe between 1921 and 1925. Clara explained that she chose to use pastels because she thought they were cleaner than paints.

Later in her life, in 1951, Clara Hagarty had another special exhibition. This was a "retrospective" show. It meant she showed many of her works from different times in her career. She even showed oil paintings of Paris and the French countryside that had never been seen before.

Clara painted less as she got older because her eyesight started to get worse.

Images for kids

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  Clara Sophia Hagarty