page_title: Charles Carstairs
section_title: Relationship with Henry Clay Frick
hierarchical_section_title: Charles Carstairs / Relationship with Henry Clay Frick
caption_attribution_description: English: Second wife of Charles Stewart Carstairs.
context_page_description: Charles Carstairs was an American art dealer. Throughout his career, Carstairs encouraged American clients to invest in European Old Master paintings. He worked closely with industrial magnate Henry Clay Frick, and was responsible for Frick's acquisition of the 'Ilchester Rembrandt' in 1906. Carstairs also worked with Joseph Widener, an American art collector and founding benefactor of National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
context_section_description: Carstairs acted as Frick's preferred dealer for some time. The large quantity of Old Master Paintings in Frick's collection demonstrates Carstairs' influence on Frick's taste. In 1908, Frick wrote in a letter to Carstairs "there is no-one whose judgment of the beautiful I have more confidence in than yours". In his relocation from Pittsburgh to New York, Frick was thrown into an increasingly competitive environment of conspicuous consumption. Carstairs turned Frick's attention to increasingly expensive Old Masters paintings as well as artworks that carried social prestige, such as aristocratic  portraits, and encouraged Frick to invest in such art as a means of bolstering his reputation.
  The two remained close friends over Frick's lifetime. Not only did Carstairs aid in the construction of Frick's East 70th Street mansion but he also acted as an honorary pallbearer at Frick's funeral.
caption: Elizabeth Stebbins Carstairs, 1908, by Francois Flameng
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