Mira Edgerly

Place: Aurora

Born: 1872

Death: 1954

Biography:

Mira Edgerly, also known as Myra Edgerly and Countess de Korzybska, was an American painter. She specialized in miniature portraits on ivory, though her 'miniatures' tended to be larger than average. Edgerly was born in Aurora, Illinois, to Rosa Haskell and Samuel Haven Edgerly. Her father was the director of the Michigan Central Railroad. The family moved to Jackson, Mississippi and then to Detroit, where Edgerly attended The Liggett School. Around 1892, Edgerly moved with her mother and sisters to San Francisco. Following the death of her father, Edgerly needed to find work to help support her impoverished family. Inspired by a magazine article about American miniature portrait painter Amalia Küssner Coudert, Edgerly began teaching herself to paint miniatures on ivory. She quickly gained access to the upper-class New York social scene and began painting commissioned portraits of 'the pre-World War I 'privileged classes.' She also traveled to London at the invitation of Mrs. Patrick Campbell, where she began painting commissioned portraits of 'the pre-World War I 'privileged classes.' Edgerly became friends with portrait photographer Arnold Genthe and posed for him. The two had a 'mutually inspiring friendship,' and discussed portraiture, arrangements, and composition. Between 1905 and 1914, Edgerly also had a studio in Paris. There she was encouraged in her work by John Singer Sargent, who appreciated the unusually large size of Edgerly's ivory miniatures. She also became friends with Gertrude Stein, who wrote about her as 'Myra Edgerly' in The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. Edgerly was a self-taught artist whose career as a successful and sought after portraitist took her from San Francisco to New York, London, Washington, Latin America, and Chicago