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Biography
Gaines Ruger Donoho (1857–1916) was an American painter.
Biography
Early life
Gaines Ruger Donoho was born on December 21, 1857 in Church Hill, Mississippi. His father, Robert Donoho (1822–1860), was a Mississippi planter from Virginia, and his mother, Julia Sophia Ruger (1828–1899), was from New England. He grew up on his father's plantation in Church Hill, Mississippi, until the elder Donoho was killed during the American Civil War. One of his mother's relatives, General Thomas H. Ruger (1833–1907), had them moved to New England with the rest of her family. He was trained as a painter at the Art Students League of New York in New York City and spent eight years in Paris.
Career
He practised as an Impressionist, Symbolist and Tonalist painter in Manhattan. In 1891, he moved to East Hampton, where he continued to paint. He is best known for his landscape and garden paintings, some of which are reminiscent of Claude Monet's Giverney garden paintings. Additionally, he also did some drawings.
Some of his work is exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, Brooklyn Museum in Brooklyn, New York City and at the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson, Mississippi.
John Lavery (1856–1941) painted his portrait.
Personal life
He was married to Matilda Ackley Donoho (1862–1939), daughter of Thomas and Caroline Ackley of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
He died on January 28, 1916 in New York City.
Selected paintings
- Wind Flowers (Metropolitan Museum of Art).
- East Hampton Garden (Long Island Museum of American Art, History, and Carriages).
- La Marcellerie (Brooklyn Museum).
Secondary source
- Ronald G. Pisano, G. Ruger Donoho (1857–1916): A Retrospective Exhibition (Hirschl & Adler Galleries, 1977, 21 pages).
- René Paul Barilleaux, G. Ruger Donoho: A Painter's Path (Jackson, Mississippi: Univ. Press of Mississippi, 1995).
- "G. Ruger Donoho (1857-1916)". google.co.uk. Retrieved 11 April 2015.
- "G. Ruger Donoho". google.co.uk. Retrieved 11 April 2015.