Who were William L. Lathrop and the New Hope School of Impressionists?
Born in 1859, William Langson Lathrop was popularly considered the dean of the New Hope art colony. He was instrumental in establishing this community of artists soon after he moved into Phillips’ Mill in 1899. His home and studio quickly emerged as the intellectual and spiritual center of the art colony, as he ferried students to his studio and his wife Annie hosted weekly teas for his colleagues. A dedicated teacher, Lathrop mentored several members of the New Hope School’s first and second generation of painters. Lathrop taught year-round classes in outdoor landscape painting, sometimes using his barge as a floating classroom on the Delaware Canal.
