Bertha Taylor

American painter Bertha Fanning Taylor studied at Hunter College and the Women’s Art School of Cooper Union, both in New York, until 1903. She was the wife of a botanist at the New York Botanical Gardens, so they took an extended trip to the West Indies for botanical research purposes after the end of their studies. She later traveled with her children through France and Italy, where Fanning Taylor worked as an art editor for the New York Herald and attended several major exhibitions in Paris. She painted mainly portraits and landscapes and designed decorations. Later, she described this time in the book My 15 Years in France.

During World War II, Fanning Taylor returned to the United States taking up residence in Norfolk, Virginia. She established her own studio where she worked as an art critic, curator, painter, educator, art historian, and illustrator. After a fall and subsequent medical treatment, she spent her final years in a nursing home.

In 1936 she submitted her painting Horse Race at Saint Cloud. The Saint-Cloud racetrack near Paris, opened in 1901, was one of the venues for the polo tournament of the 1924 Olympics.