L'Engle, Provincetown, MA

William L'Engle

William in his studio at Long Nook.
1955 photo by George Yater, Truro, MA.

A 1906 graduate of Yale, William L’Engle spent the years 1909 through 1914 in Paris, where he studied at the prestigious Ecole des Beaux-Arts and Academie Julian. He met and married Lucy Stelle Brown while in Paris. Following the outbreak of World War I, the L’Engles returned to America, spending their summers in Provincetown and their winters in New York City.

Although exhibiting frequently at New York City galleries, William is most closely associated with the modernist faction of the Provincetown Art Association, which included progressive artists such as Karl Knaths and William and Marguerite Zorach. As far as is known, his very last painting was The Sacrifice of Abraham, 1957, the year of his death, which explores an interpretation of the biblical story that has fascinated major artists throughout history.

"It is deeply fitting that the studio of William L’Engle, with his pictures on the walls, should become a place of contemplation and of creative thought for American artists and lovers of art; indeed for anyone in quest of his true self within the chaos, stupefying and unmanning, of contemporary life. For William L’Engle’s work is characterized above all by its fluid open-ness, its refusal of all dogma, its elegance of search, its grace of response to the winds and forms of doctrine, - as of a man firm in his own stance yet moved by many forces."

- Waldo Frank, 1959

SELECTED WORKS BY WILLIAM L'ENGLE

Beaux Art Fountain 1914, Oil on Canvas 28 1/2 x 23 1/2	Self Portrait, 1914, Oil on Canvas 20 x 16	Portrait of Lucy 1919, Oil on Canvas 26 1/2 x 20 1/2	Mary and Joseph 1922, Oil on canvas 29 1/2 x 23 1/2
View of Bastia 1923, Watercolor 12 1/2 x 9 1/2	Portrait of Lucy in Cavaliare 1923, Oil on canvas	Bastille Day, Cavalier 1923, Oil on canvas 24 5/8 x 31 5/8	Backside Beach 1924, Oil on canvas 29 1/2 x 53 3/4
Portrait of Madeleine 1924, Oil on canvas	L'Engle Family Map Oil on canvas, 1924 19 x 54	Long Nook Road 1925, Oil on canvas 19 3/4 x 29 3/4	Pink Room Vase 1925, Oil on board 15 1/2 x 9 1/2
Mexican Group 1925, Oil on canvas 19 1/2 x 15 1/2	Abstract Jockey 1925, Oil on board 13 1/2 x 16	South Truro Church 1925, Oil on board 14 x 18	L'Engle Family 1925, Oil on Board
Trapeze Artist 1926, Oil on canvas 40 1/4 x 30	Cranberry Pickers 1926, Oil on canvas 23 3/4 x 29 3/4	Circus Scene 1926, Oil on board 29 1/2 x 39 1/2	Martha Graham Dancer 1927, Oil on canvas 30 x 40
Not Phat Francis 1927, Oil on board 20 x 16	Aura 1928, Oil on board 17 1/2 x 13 1/2	Madeleine and Thelma 1930, Oil on canvas 39 x 29	Abstract Figure 1930, Watercolor 9 x 7 9 1/2 x 7 1/2
Nude and Six-sided Mouse Trap 1930, Oil on canvas 24 x 30	Small Nude 1932, Oil on board	Mexico City View 1933, Watercolor 9 1/2 x 13	Xochimilco, Viva Mexico 1933, Watercolor 9 5/8 x 13 1/2
Stonington Mill, Connecticut 1934, Oil on canvas 24 x 30	Building New York 1935, Oil on canvas 30 x 24	Cuban Scene 1938, Oil on board 16 x 20	Local Traffic 1938, Oil on canvas 24 x 30
Color Comics 1938, Oil on board 16 x 20	Cobb Farm, South Truro 1942, Watercolor 13 x 19 1/2	Freedom Fighters 1943, Watercolor 14 x 19 3/4	General Patton 1944, Watercolor 20 x 14
Yulee Navy Base 1946, Oil on canvas 30 x 40	St. John's River 1946, Oil on canvas 24 x 30	Abstract Weather Map 1950, Watercolor and Ink on Paper 13 1/2 x 19	Checkerboard Weather Map 1953, Watercolor 18 1/2 x 24 1/2
Lighthouse Nudes 1954, Oil on canvas 36 x 24	St. Augustine Lighthouse, Abstracted 1954, Oil on canvas 28 1/2 x 30	Abstract Weather Map 2 1955, Oil on canvas 23/1/2 x 29	Cathedral of Albi 1956, Watercolor 19 3/4 x 14 1/4
Nightmare or The End 1957, Oil on canvas	Sacrifice of Abraham 1957, Oil on canvas 50 x 24