Rhoda Holmes Nicholls

Rhoda Holmes Nicholls was a British-American painter and art instructor. She painted primarily florals, landscapes and figures, working in watercolors, pastels and oils. She earned international recognition for her watercolors; a number of her prize-winning pieces were exhibited and reproduced throughout the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

Nicholls was born March 28, 1854 in Coventry, England. She studied at the Bloomsbury School of Art and later at the Kensington Museum.[1] She travelled to Rome, becoming a member of the art group Circello Artistico. She was also the second woman elected as a member of the Rome Watercolor Society.[2] Her paintings were highly regarded and were exhibited at the Royal Academy in London, as well as throughout Rome and Turin.[3] She also spent time in South Africa, where she lived on her brother’s ostrich farm.[4] She returned to England, where she continued to exhibit her work.

Nicholls met her husband, American artist Burr Nicholls during her time in Italy. The couple married in 1884 and moved permanently to the United States later that year.[5] Nicholls quickly gained recognition for her art in the United States. She had professional memberships with the National Association of Women Artists, the New York Watercolor Society, the American Water Color Society and the National Arts Club.[6] She won medals at major shows, including the New York Prize Fund Exhibition in 1886, the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 and the Atlanta Exposition in 1895.[7] She was also regularly featured in many notable exhibitions. She exhibited in fourteen exhibitions at the National Academy of Design between 1884-1917, eleven annual exhibitions at the Pennsylvania Academy from 1884-1903 and twenty-five exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1888-1918.[8]

Nicholls and her husband divorced after her painting had been accepted to the Paris Salon and his was not.[9] The separation made headlines, many newspapers warned women “about the dangers of success and its potential influence on marital and domestic bliss.”[10] Despite the divorce, Nicholls remained ambitious, her art career flourished, and she continued to exhibit regularly. 

Nicholls also spent time working as a teacher; she taught at the William Merritt Chase Shinnecock School on Long Island and the Art Students League in New York.[11] She additionally served as co-editor for the prestigious art journal Palette and Brush and was on the staff of the Art Interchange and Art Amateur.[12]

Nicholls died on September 7, 1930 in Stanford, Connecticut.