Vincent Aderente (1880-1941)

He was born at Naples in Italy. He came to America with his parents at the age of nine (1889) and studied at the Art Students League of New York when he worked on the ballroom at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel - see the J.J. Astor House. Much of his early career was spent as an assistant to the "dean of American mural painting" Edwin H. Blashfield. In 1922, they worked on the murals now seen at the Detroit Public Library. In 1923, Vincent was solely responsible for designing and painting the historic murals of Joan of Arc for Mrs Alva Vanderbilt Belmont at her castle on Long Island, Beacon Towers. Other examples of his work can be seen at St. Matthew's Cathedral in Washington D.C.; the Denver Mint; the U.S. Post Office at Flushing, Queens; the Queens County Court House; Kings County Hospital; Long Island Savings Bank; and, the Codington County Courthouse. Smaller commissions included illustrating printed poems for the American Weekly and the New York Sunday Americans while he is perhaps best known for his series of World War I posters entitled “Columbia Calls” and eight US Government Bonds in 1935. In 1909, he married Grace DiMartino and had two children.