Martha Susan Baker, 1871 – 1911

Photo of Martha Susan Baker reproduced in the Memorial Exhibition, Catalogue (1912)

Born in Evansville, Indiana, Martha Susan Baker was known for her portrait miniatures on ivory, though she also painted landscapes and large portraits. She graduated with honors from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1898, then worked as an instructor of sketching and watercolor painting at her alma mater until 1904. She also taught briefly at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Baker was among the American women invited to represent the United States at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, where she showed two miniatures, "Miss Ethel Coe," and "Ideal Head." By 1903, she "was widely recognized as one of Chicago’s most important younger artists" (Greenhouse). That same year, Baker served as a member of the jury for the Annual Exhibition of the Art Students League in Chicago. In 1904, she received an honorable mention at an exhibition of the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh.

Martha Susan Baker, "Elizabeth Humphrey," watercolor on ivory, 1899, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Baker lived in Paris from 1906 – 1909, and it was during this time that she began working with pastels (Memorial Exhibition catalog). Though she did not reside at the American Girls' Art Club, she exhibited her miniatures, each one just about 3 inches in circumference, at the Club's annual show in 1909. She was hailed by French critics, who especially admired "the delicacy and fineness of her technique" (Cowles 404). Her portrait of sculptor Edward Warren Sawyer received an honorable mention at the 1909 Salon des artistes français. Baker exhibited other paintings and miniatures at various Salons from 1907 – 1911 and her work was also shown at the Royal Academy in London.

Martha Baker's time in Paris was transformational, as the subdued and monochromatic palettes of her earlier works were replaced by brighter, more vivid colors in her later "modern" pieces (Greenhouse). After three years abroad, she returned to Chicago and continued her career in the United States.

 

Martha Susan Baker, "An Art Student of Paris," watercolor on ivory miniature, 1899. The Cleveland Museum of Art
Martha Baker, "The Blue Gown," Portrait of Ethel Coe, watercolor on ivory, 1899, Cleveland Museum of Art. The miniature won a bronze medal at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904

"The prominent Spanish painter Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida, who visited Chicago in 1909 and again in 1911, declared Baker the foremost miniature painter of modern times" (Bartman). Three of her pastels and two of her watercolor miniatures were exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago's Twenty-Third Annual Exhibition of Water-Colors, Pastels and Miniatures by American Artists in spring 1911 (cf. Catalog entries no. 10, 11, 12, 13, 14), just months before Baker's untimely death:

  • "Portrait of Miss Marion Tooker," miniature lent by Mrs. B.F. Felix [Marion Farwell Tooker was a former resident at 4 rue de Chevreuse and an exhibitor at the 1910 AWAA show]
  • "Portrait of Mrs. C.E.B.," pastel
  • "Miss Virginia Wagner," pastel
  • "Portrait of Señora Sorolla," miniature lent by Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida
  • "Miss Virginia Clark," pastel
Martha Baker, "Twilight no. 2 1898," 1898, watercolor, Smithsonian American Art Museum

In addition to her miniatures and pastels, Baker also painted murals (Fine Arts Building, Chicago), larger portraits, and abstract landscapes. The Smithsonian American Art Museum owns one of her early landscapes, "Twilight no. 2 1898."

Baker died of appendicitis in Chicago on December 21, 1911 on the eve of her fortieth birthday. Soon after, the Art Institute of Chicago mounted a memorial exhibition of more than fifty of her works, including 17 miniatures, 15 oil paintings, and two sketches of the Luxembourg gardens.

 

Martha Baker, Portrait of Carl Van Vechten, oil painting, 1906, NYPL Digital Collections

Sources

  • Sources

  • Bartman, Ashley. Digital description of "The Blue Gown," Cleveland Museum of Art.
  • Catalog, Annual Exhibition of the Art Students League of Chicago, March 5, 1903, pp. 1-14.
  • Catalog, A Memorial Exhibition of Works by the Late Martha S. Baker: At the Art Institute of Chicago, Oct. 1 to 23, 1912. Art Institute of Chicago.
  • Catalog, Twenty-Third Annual Exhibition of Water-Colors, Pastels and Miniatures by American Artists, May 9 - June 7, 1911. Art Institute of Chicago. 
  • Cowles, Miss Kilbourne. "American Girls Students in Paris." The Advance, vol. 57, no. 2266, April 1, 1909, p. 404.
  • Greenhouse, Wendy. "Martha Baker," M. Christine Schwartz Collection, 2020.