Anne Bowbeer Alexander Scott Collection

This collection was donated to the Penn Museum in 2011 by Anne Bowbeer, the wife of Alexander Scott's nephew, following the death of Mabel Scott Hall, Alexander Scott's widow.

Alexander Scott was born in 1854 in Camberwell, Surrey, the son of the famed British portrait painter for the Illustrated London News, Thomas Dewel Scott.

Alexander Scott became known as a world traveler, landscape painter and collector of Asian antiquities. He spent most of his time in Asia but also visited New Zealand and lived in Hawaii from 1906 to 1908. Scott's most famous art works, views of Nepal and Kashmir, were exhibited in London in 1886 at the Indio-Colonial Exhibition and in 1889 at the Fine Arts Society. A posthumous London exhibit was held in 1932.

From 1915 to 1918, Scott led a Museum expedition to India. He successfully collected artifacts that he either donated or sold to the American Museum of Natural History, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology and the Pennsylvania Museum in Fairmount Park. This was one of the first collections of Asian art to come to the United States. Numerous objects are part of the Asiam Section of the Penn Museum.(See: Related archival material note.)

Although primarily a landscape artist, Scott's portrait of William Goodell hangs in the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia.

Alexander Scott was born in 1854 in Camberwell, Surrey, the son of the famed portrait painter for the Illustrated London News, Thomas Dewel Scott. He became known as a world traveler, landscape painter and collector of Asian antiquities.

Scott donated or sold his Asian objects to the Penn Museum among others. They are housed with the Asian section collection.

This collection was donated to the Penn Museum in 2011 by Anne Bowbeer, the wife of Alexander Scott's nephew, following the death of Mabel Scott Hall, Alexander Scott's widow. The collection consists of seven folders representing biographical data, photographs of his paintings, a self portrait photograph and publications related to magazine, news and exhibitions.

Publication Information: University of Pennsylvania: Penn Museum Archives, 1/6/2016

Finding Aid Author:

Use Restrictions:

For additional information please see: records of the Asian Section; Collections series (PU-Mu. 0543) for records from 1914 to 1948, accounts, Indian collection, Tibetan collection.

Form(s)/Genre(s)

• Photographs

Personal Name(s)

• Bowbeer, Anne
• Scott Hall, Mabel
• Scott, Alexander

Subject(s)

• Art history
• Exhibits