WOMAN IN ART
As Louise Rowland King, she began her study of art at sixteen in the school of the National Academy of Design. Later her study continued at the Art Students' League under instruction of Kenyon Cox.
In 1895 Mrs. Cox was represented by a larger canvas that gave her own original idea of "The Fates." Herself confessed to the mythological heresy in an explanation attached to the picture. She said: "As you see, the faces are young and beautiful, but almost expressionless. The heads are drooping, the eyes heavy as though half asleep. My idea is that they are merely instruments under the control of a higher power. They perform their work, they must do it without will or wish of their own. It would be beyond human or superhuman endurance for any conscious instrument to bear for ages and ages the horrible responsibility placed upon the Fates."
In 1896 a religious subject from her easel attracted attention—"The Annunciation." It was her first exhibit with the Society of American Artists, and immediately came an offer from a large firm of church-window makers for the use of it for a model to copy in glass. The workmanship, composition, drawing and harmonious coloring whereby the artist expressed her unusual idea of the Fates, pronounced Mrs. Cox an artist in thought, sentiment and knowledge of the technique of her art. In both of these pictures and in her later work, one sees characteristics that add proof (were it necessary) to the truth of her personal statement concerning her student years at the Academy, when she said: "I feel that I owe a great debt of gratitude to those professors who with their excellent Jerome traditions gave us a respect for workmanship."
For more than thirty years Mrs. Cox has exhibited annually and her work has ever maintained a strong yet refined production. Her subjects are often ideal and decorative in treatment. An incident in point is her "Genius of Autumn." In the purpling tint of October air comes the Genius of Autumn to earth, with the wings of Time. He alights, girdled with the dun shades of upland and plain, the persistent visitor to earth, and bends to sickle the tall, brave mullein plants on hillside and in pasture lots, the last flowers of the dying year.
The third Hallgarten prize of 1896 at the National Academy went to Mrs. Cox for her canvas titled "Pomona." It showed the atmosphere and beauty of color usual in her paintings, and the stillness at heat of noon. Against the summer landscape a woman of large, harmonious proportions is holding a basket of fruit.
Mrs. Cox is an earnest worker. Each picture is the result of many sketches and the study of many models. For the Virgin in "Annunciation" a model was
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