The CT League of Art Students

Photo from 3/2/1930 Hartford Courant of the Pickle Club with, from left to right, Walter O. Eitel, Walter C. Carney, Oscar Anderson, James Britton, Alfred J. Eaton, William Smith, Harry Schenker, Isaac Grant, Thomas Brabazon, Charles Noel Flagg, James Goodwin McManus

Clinton O’Callahan was very involved in the Charles Noel Flagg Evening Art School for Men (known as the ‘Greenwich Village’ of Hartford, CT), attending from his teen years through his late 20s. It was there that Clinton met the now famous Milton Avery and other Connecticut artists. He would continue to work, exhibit and socialize with them during his career both in the United States and Paris.

In addition, Clinton was a member of the CT League of Art Students, also founded by Charles Noel Flagg. The Hartford Courant on Dec 7th, 1919 wrote about the celebration the Art League had for the returning members who were soldiers in WWI, one of whom was Clinton O’Callahan. He had survived the injuries sustained in the war and was immersed in painting the scenes that he sketched while billeted in French farm towns.

These early years in Hartford, surrounded by the bohemian environment of the evening school, fostered his desire to be a full-time artist and ultimately instilled in him the need to return to Paris, the pinnacle of creative explosion in the 1920s.

Gary Knoble has researched the history of the Charles Noel Flagg school and the CT League of Art Students extensively, documenting the early influential community Clinton O’Callahan was immersed in. He has graciously shared his work for this site. Click on the below links for his full essays.

Gary Knoble is a trustee of the New Britain Museum of American Art and an independent researcher, advisor, and lecturer of art history with a focus on Hartford, CT artists. With an extensive understanding about the thriving art scenes, art societies and exhibitions of Connecticut artists from the 19th and 20th centuries, he has researched Clinton O’Callahan and compiled an essay about his life and art, utilizing Clinton O’Callahan’s Catalogue Raisonne along with historical information. Knoble actively collects paintings of CT artists and owns a painting by O’Callahan called, ‘Vase d’Anemones’, 1930, oil on board, 18”x15”, which is included in our featured works.