Alison, Christmas Day

William Sergeant Kendall first studied art under Thomas Eakins. He then finished his art education in France, at the Académie Julian, before passing the entrance examination to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Returning to the U.S. in 1892, the artist taught a women’s painting class at the Cooper Union in New York. One of his students was Margaret Weston Stickney, whom he married early in 1896. With the birth of their first child, Kendall found his favorite subject—his family—especially his three daughters: Elizabeth (b. 1896), Beatrice (b. 1902) and Alison (b. 1907).