born Feb. 20, 1897, North Harvey, Ill., U.S. died Nov. 18, 1983, Woodstock, Vt. U.S. painter. He was the son of a painter. Independently wealthy, he studied at various institutions, developing a meticulously detailed style and often spending several years of painstaking work on a single painting. With pinpoint exactness and hallucinatory hyperclarity, he repeatedly depicted decay, corruption, and the wreckage of age, often with great emotional intensity. Among his important works is That Which I Should Have Done I Did Not Do (1931-41). He gained fame with his portrait (1943-44) of the title character in the film The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), depicting the final stage of Gray's dissolute life