Emma Eilers

Emma Eilers (September 12, 1870 – March 27, 1951) was an American painter from Sea Cliff, New York, who, despite her uncontrollable shakes, was official regionally for her work.

Emma Eilers was born to her parents Anton Eilers and Elizabeth (Emrich) Eilers September 12, 1870, in the town of Morrisania (now a neighborhood of the Bronx), becoming the 5th of 6 siblings. Census records suggest that during her first 10 years she spent most of her liveliness in Morrisania, growing going on amongst her associates and German- American associates who lived nearby.

Sometime surrounded by 1878 and 1881, her parents moved to Denver, Colorado, for a few years during which Anton became a wealthy mining engineer and smelter voyager in the region, specifically in Leadville and Pueblo, Colorado. In the span of just a few years, she would look her family's life alter dramatically as the Eilers relations accumulated great financial gains that allowed them to buy multiple homes, travel more easily amongst New York and Colorado, and now travel surrounded by Germany and the US.

Unlike her oldest sister Else, who would graduate from Denver High School in 1883 or her brother Karl who graduated from the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute in 1884, Emma associated her three sisters (Louise, Anna & Meta) whom all graduated from the Packer Collegiate Institute, with Emma obtaining her diploma on June 12, 1889.

Given her father's success, Emma was adept to pursue her incorporation in art at her leisure. In 1889, around the era of her graduation from high school, she co-founded the Club Women of New York, which far ahead became the National Association of Women Artists (NAWA). Founding members included Adele Bedell, Anita Ashley, one of the beforehand presidents, and Olive Brown, Matilda De Cordoba, Ethel Prellwitz, Elizabeth Watrous, Fanny Tewksbury, Elizabeth Cheever and, of course, Emma Eilers.

In late 1892, she travelled behind the entire relations to visit family in Germany as portion of her sister Anna's wedding to Hans Weber. This is her only known international trip.

At some lessening during the 1890s, Emma studied at the Shinnecock Hills Summer School of Art, which was the first important summer art intellectual in America devoted to En plein freshen painting, or painting outdoors. This is the deserted verified mature she attended an art school.

By the late 1890s, Emma seems to have become a skilled artist. For example, in 1897, the Brooklyn Eagle reported that "Miss Eilers of St.Marks avenue does some of the strongest and best be in at the league. Her painting of the figure is fine, unsurpassed by any supplementary attendant of the well-known art school ...". Later in the year, according to substitute Brooklyn Eagle Article, she was buzzing working "with mural and new designs. A composition having for its subject St.Francis D'Assisi and the Birds was one in which the drawing and color were excellent".

According to The New York Times , in 1899 one of her paintings was one of several Art Students' League of New York pieces exhibited at a Paris Exposition, which was later presented as a enduring exhibit at the Musee Pedagogique. During the winter of 1899, Emma was painting out of Miss Kate Dow's studio, in the 'Bank Building', where regular art shows were held, as Kate had just traveled to Paris.

From the 1890s through the 1920s she and three of her sisters lived, unmarried, with their father and mother, splitting period between homes in Brooklyn, NY, and Sea Cliff, NY. Music was a huge part of the family's life, with her oldest sister Else a 'fine' pianist, according to several other articles and her sister Meta an excellent violinist. By 1898, the 'Misses Eilers' would host every Monday afternoon Sight Reading Class of 20 women, which the Brooklyn Eagle described as 'the latest novelty in the Hill society'. At least some of this love of music likely was the consequences of Emma's brother Karl Eilers marrying Leonie Wurlitzer, daughter of the founder of the Wurlitzer Company, Rudolph Wurlitzer. Whether Emma played any instruments or actively participated in music once her sisters is unknown.

Between 1918 and 1921, both Emma's mother and father, along behind sisters Louise and Meta, would pass away, though Emma yet had her oldest sister Else breathing at Sea Cliff along as soon as her brother, Karl, and his wife and 3 kids nearby.

It's ordinary how in the future Emma developed bodily shakes that the associates called her 'palsy', but several first hand accounts describe how her brush would shake right up to the narrowing where brush met canvas and then, suddenly, smooth strokes would appear. Dinner grow old was plus a slightly odd experience for visitors as Emma's 'shakes' would cause the table to shake at times, rattling silverware, plates and glasses.

While Emma's pretend is not generally capably known, she did paint regularly in her large studio at Sea Cliff until her death upon March 27, 1951. Her studio has previously been converted into a house and still exists. Emma was the last of her 6 siblings to die, passing away at her Sea Cliff house that was the Eilers family home for higher than 5 decades.

At the period of her death, relatives tab that her studio was full of paints of various sizes, "they were laying everywhere". Some of her paintings passed all along to relatives, some have recently appeared at auction, but most appear to have been destroyed.