*This painting is sold but the artist is regularly available in our inventory		Ida Wells Stroud* New Orleans 1869 – 1944 Los Angeles Harbor Scene Gouache 14  x 8 inches Signed:  Ida Wells Stroud Ida Wells Stroud was born in New Orleans.  Later she studied at the Temple Grove Seminary and Saratoga Springs in New York where she graduated in 1886.  In the late 1880s she studied with André Molinary in New Orleans and William M. Chase in the 1890s.  In 1900 she studied at the Art Students League in New York City, one of the most important art schools in the USA.  The same year she studied at the Pratt Institute with A.W. Dow.  Stroud continued to take summer courses at various art schools around the country until 1936. Ida Stroud and her daughter Clara Stroud were at the forefront of a nationwide movement during the first three decades of the 20th century that helped establish watercolor as a medium uniquely suited to the spirit of American artists.  During the same period she was also a highly influential art teacher at the Newark School Fine and Industrial Art.   Ida Wells Stroud was a member of several important art associations, including New Orleans AA from 1896-1897, the Manasquan River Artist Group that she founded in 1932, the National Association of Women Artists and Newark Art Club. In our horizontal composition Harbor Scene, Ida Wells Stroud has depicted a charming scene as it unfolds on the waterfront, held in bright impressionistic colors, using primarily green, pink, purple, and yellow.  In the background we find a row of houses facing the waterfront, held in a somber, gray palette that creates a stark visual contrast to the colorful scenery that is unfolding on the water.  Here we find a boat gently mopping on the waves.  People are sitting in the boat, waiting for the rest of the company to enter and join them, before they take of on what appears to be a sightseeing tour.  A few elegantly dressed women are still on their way down into the boat, and the captain is standing at the end of the stairs waiting to assist them.