William Ashby McCloy

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Portrait of artist William Ashby McCloy (1913-2000), in front his three part mural depicting the history of Wisconsin. He was born in Maryland and spent most of his childhood in China, returning to the United States at age 13. He received a BA in Art at the State University of Iowa, earning a scholarship awarded to that member of the senior class "giving the most promise of attainment in a learned career." He studied painting, printmaking, and sculpture, and earned an MA in psychology in 1936. In 1939/1941 he began to teach at the University of Wisconsin and came to know the school's artist in residence, American regionalist painter John Steuart Curry. After working as Curry's mural assistant, McCloy served as a clinical psychologist in the Army during World War II. McCloy returned to the State University of Iowa, where he earned an MFA in 1949 and a PhD in Art History in 1958. McCloy served as Director of the School of Art at the University of Manitoba from 1950 to 1954 and afterward became Chairman of the Art Department at Connecticut College, from which he retired in 1978. His paintings and sculpture were exhibited throughout the United States and Canada and won numerous awards.