ALEXANDER POPE

Alexander Pope was best known as a sculptor and painter of animals. Born in Boston, Pope worked in his family’s lumber business, which influenced him in woodworking and carving animals. His art career began in the late 1870’s, when he studied perspective and drawing with sculptor William Rimmer. Pope started painting birds and animals in addition to his woodwork. By 1887, Pope had become Boston’s representative of the trompe l’oeil school. Of all the masters, Pope is considered closest to Harnett in his use of rich, dark colors. By 1912, Pope’s dislike for his trompe l’oeil paintings allowed him to give up the style and return to painting animal portraits until his death in 1924. He was a member of the Copley Society in 1893 and the Boston Art Club. After 1912, he published two portfolios of lithographs: “Upland Game Birds and Waterfowl of the United States “, and “Celebrated Dogs of America”. Alexander Pope was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1849. In the 60s and early 70s, he worked in his father’s lumber business, where he learned how to carve. In 1875, he began exhibiting his carved wooden trophies of live and dead game birds. He quickly became a well-known animal portrait painter, and was commissioned for several famous horse and champion dog and cat portraits. In the late 1880s, Pope began painting large trompe-l’oeil hunting pictures and compositions of military paraphernelia, and along with William M. Harnett, became one of Boston’s leading figures in this particular domain. After 1912, he focused mainly on portraits of people and their animals. Pope died in 1924.