1870–1916 · Virkested
Philadelphia
1879
Death of his fiancée Kathrin Crowell
Kathrin Crowell, to whom Eakins had been engaged for five years, died of meningitis.
1880
Acquires a camera
From 1880 Eakins had his own camera: paintings such as “Mending the Net” (1881) and “Arcadia” (1883) derive in part from his photographs. He is credited with having “introduced the camera to the American art studio”; some eight hundred photographs are attributed to him and his circle.
1882
Becomes director of the Pennsylvania Academy
Eakins became the Academy's director. His methods were controversial — no drawing from antique casts and no prize competitions, a quick move from charcoal to paint, anatomy through dissection and photography — yet by the early 1880s the course was called the most “liberal and advanced in the world”.
1883
Brings Eadweard Muybridge to lecture at the Academy
In the late 1870s Eakins had discovered Eadweard Muybridge's photographic motion studies, especially those of horses; in 1883 he and the University of Pennsylvania trustee Fairman Rogers arranged for Muybridge to lecture at the Academy.
1884
Marries Susan Macdowell
At 40, Eakins married his former pupil, the painter Susan Hannah Macdowell. In their childless marriage she painted only sporadically, supporting her husband's career, shared his passion for photography and stood by him in his difficult years, even when some of her family turned against him.