Mildred Anne Butler

Mildred Anne Butler (January 11, 1858 in Thomastown, County Kilkenny – October 11, 1941) was an Irish painter.

Career

Born in Thomastown, Butler's work often reflects the birds and animals native to the country surrounding her Kilmurry home. She first studied under Paul Jacob Naftel of London, crediting him for her understanding of watercolour. She traveled to Brussels and Paris in the early 1880s, studying alongside contemporaries such as Walter Osborne and Sir John Lavery. In France she was associated with the Newlyn School where she studied under Norman Garstin. Her French training was considered highly uncoventional in British art circles (the Royal Academy in London refused to show artists who painted in the French style and the young painters who did so had to form their own society in order to exhibit). This attitude waned throughout the 1890s, and in 1896 Mildred Butler's Morning Bath was acquired by the Tate Gallery, a rare honor for a watercolourist, let alone a woman. Her work also received extensive noble support, as Britain's Queen Mary was presented with her illustrations on multiple occasions. She exhibited just five works at the Royal Hibernian Academy, but also displayed works at the Belfast Art Society show and was one of the first nine academicians elected by the Ulster Academy of Arts in 1930. She was granted full membership into the Royal Watercolour Society in 1937, having been an associate as early as 1896. Throughout her career Butler's works were showcased as far abroad as the United States and Japan. Kilkenny's Museum of Art was named the Butler Gallery in her honor.

External links

• Butler at Mark Adams Contemporary Irish Art
• Butler at Art Net
• Watercolour Collection at Artprice