Julian Oliver Davidson

1853-1894

American (Nyack, New York)

Julian O. Davidson was born on December 17, 1853, to Matthias and Harriet (nee Standish) Davidson. His father was a civil engineer who, while Julian was “still a boy” was tasked to oversee the construction of the Havana Railroad. Julian made five trips to Cuba with his father and, on the final trip, the ship they were sailing on became shipwrecked in a severe storm. Rather than frighten Julian off of the water for good, he became infatuated with it.
As a teen, Davidson was sent to the Rectory School in Hamden, Connecticut, a college preparatory school modeled after a military academy. At 16, when Davidson graduated, he became an apprentice in his father’s firm as a surveyor and draughtsman. Davidson’s eye was to the sea, however, and preferred to devote his time sketching ships coming and going out of New York Harbor. With a burning desire to leave New York for life on the sea, Davidson “ran away” and joined the crew of SS Arizona -a side-wheel steamer that made voyages to the Far East via the Suez Canal. It is during his time aboard Arizona that his nautical eye began to come into focus.

As Loren Bloom, of Maritime Collectors puts it, Davidson “[assisted] the engineer, ship's boy, and storekeeper”, returning home “with paintings and journals filled with sketches of sails, rigging, sailing ships, and water.” Rather than continue in his apprenticeship in the family business, Davidson moved into an apartment in Manhattan where he devoted two years studying under the watchful eye of famed Dutch artist, Mauritz de Haas. It is with de Haas that Davidson met fellow artists, Winslow Homer, Frederick Church, William Bradford, Albert Bierstadt, and Stanford R. Gifford.

Davidson was a prolific maritime artist, some critics even going as far as to describe him as one of the nineteenth century’s, “premier naval artists”. He was best known works of the famous naval battles of the American Civil War which were often published in the Century Magazine and Harper's Weekly.

Artist profile image: Julian Oliver Davidson, 1888. The American Bookmaker, Vol. 8, No. 3, 1888.