Frederic James

Born in Kansas City, Regionalist painter Frederic James (1915-1985) attended the Kansas City Art Institute and then the University of Michigan and the Cranbrook Academy of Art for architecture and design. James showed promise as an architecture student, winning a national competition sponsored by MoMA to design a theater in Williamsburg, Virginia. However, he realized that painting was his passion and returned to Kansas City in 1939 to focus on that medium. In 1940, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art acquired his painting Elevated through the Friends of Art Purchase Prize in the museum’s Midwestern Artists Exhibition. That same year, the Kansas City Art Institute hired him to teach watercolor courses, and there James began a close friendship with famed fellow Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton.

In March of 1941, James was drafted into the Army to work as a draftsman for the Army Corps of Engineers. In 1943, the War Department Art Advisory Committee designated him as leader of the War Art Unit for the South Atlantic War Project in Brazil. For the remainder of his service, James worked as both a photographer and painter to establish a “pictorial war record” for the United States Army Forces in South America. He separated from the Army as a master sergeant in the fall of 1945, returning to his hometown of Kansas City to teach at the Art Institute. Soon after, James left the school to focus on his own work. 

After a one-man exhibition of his watercolors at the Nelson-Atkins in 1954, he began to concentrate less on promoting his work. James continued to paint, however, and found his subject matter locally, particularly rural Missouri and Kansas scenery. He often painted directly from observation -- “en plein air” style -- but also from photographs he took during his world travels which included destinations such as Japan, Egypt, Jamaica, and Europe. In his later career, James also created murals for many local Missouri and Kansas businesses and continued designing sets for local organizations such as the Kansas Folly Theater and the Kansas City Repertory Theater.

He died in 1985 in Kansas City, Missouri.