Paris & Tryon: George C. Aid (1872 - 1938) and His Artistic Circles in France and North Carolina
by Michael J. McCue
ISBN 0-9726801-0-1
8.5 x 11, 230 pages, 255 black-and-white illustrations, 39 color illustrations, reference bibliography, index, Smythe-sewn hard binding, dust jacket.
The American artist George C. Aid was born at Quincy, Illinois in 1872. From the St. Louis School of Fine Arts he went to Paris for study at the Julian Academy.
He lived in Europe, first in Paris, then in Bordighera, Italy, for a total of fifteen years. He was visiting in the US when WWI broke out; he never returned to Europe.
He settled in the artists community of Tryon, NC. He owned and operated a vineyard there for eight years, painting all the while. In the 1930s Aid was invited to teach and work in Charlotte; over a two-year period prior to the onset of heart trouble, he made a major impact on the city's emerging art community.
Aid's art was exhibited in Boston, Chicago, and the Paris Salon. He took a silver medal at the 1904 St. Louis world's fair and a bronze medal at the 1915 San Francisco exposition. At the time of his death he was one of the most respected artists in North Carolina and the South.
His early work was largely oil on canvas or etching. After moving to Tryon he worked in oils and in French chalk on paper.
The first retrospective of his work was held in Tryon, NC, in 2002.
- the art of Aid, his friends and contemporaries in Europe and America
- period photographs of artists, their studios, and locales they depicted in their art
- publication date: February 2003
- winner of the 2003 Willie Parker Peace History Book Award of the North Carolina Society of Historians
$65
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