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William Posey Silva (1859-1948)

A landscape painter, William Silva was an important art world figure in Tennessee and also in California, where he moved in 1913 and for thirty-five years devoted himself to painting cypresses, eucalypti, dunes, and coasts.

He was born in Savannah, Georgia, and studied at Catham Academy and engineering at the University of Virginia. He inherited the family chinaware business, which he ran successfully for thirty years until he began painting at age 50.

In 1887, he moved to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and there became known as "the finest artist at the turn of the century" (Gerdts "Art Across America" v. III).

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He painted in an impressionist style and did many panoramic views of Chattanooga as well as paintings of the pine forests near Savannah. Initially he pursued his chinaware business there but in 1894, began to take art instruction.

Encouraged by his wife, he retired from his business in 1907 and enrolled at the Aca