Walter Gay

Walter Gay was an American painter and art collector in Paris and from 1907 also in Chateau Le Bréau near Fontainbleu. Gay moved to Paris in 1876 where he became a pupil of Léon Bonnat. Bonnat encouraged the young artist to travel to Spain, where he studied and copied the work of Velázquez. In 1889, Gay married Matilda E. Travers (1855–1943), the daughter of William R. Travers, a wealthy and prominent New York investor who, on his death in 1887, left Matilda a fortune of three million dollars. During his lifetime, his work was exhibited in every major European city:, among them in Antwerp, Berlin, Budapest, Vienna and Paris. In 1904, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate Gay was also a notable collector of artworks. Following his death in 1937, his widow donated some 200 works of Dutch, Italian, English and French paintings, drawings and illustrations to the Louvre.  For more information on Walter Gay, see: James N. Carder, American Art at Dumbarton Oaks (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2010), 56–64. William Rieder, A Charmed Couple: The Art and Life of Walter and Matilda Gay (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2000).