Robert Hopkin
Scottish-born, Robert Hopkin immigrated to Detroit in 1843, where he remained almost exclusively until his death in 1909. He was known to have produced more than 390 oil and watercolor paintings, of which his Great Lakes Marine scenes are the most renowned.
In 1907 Hopkin founded the informal Hopkin Club, which later became the Historic Scarab Club of Detroit. Established by Hopkin and his contemporaries as a space where Detroit artists and patrons could convene and exchange ideas while making art accessible to the community.
His remarkable legacy is expressed poignantly in the eulogy given by Detroit Museum of Art Director A.H. Griffith in 1909:
“If Robert Burns caught the music of the fields and heard the songs of the brooks, certainly the same elements told their story to Robert Hopkin, and each revealed them to the world according to his mode of expression. For nature was Robert Hopkin’s world. We might say his religion was a love of the beautiful. His affection made the whole world kin and drew closer to him the bonds of those who knew him.”
-The Detroit Free Press, March 24, 1909
“What shall we say of this grand old man, who has passed from among us, this one who loved the earth and the sky, the rivers, lakes and seas, who saw in nature’s changing moods the harmony and glory of color that filled his heart with happiness, who grew thoughtful and pensive in the shadow and reveled in the sunshine? They were but the echo of the thoughts and aspirations that filled his mind and heart with joy. His sympathy was unbounded, his love of nature and all God’s creatures unlimited.”
(The Detroit Free Press, March 24, 1909, page 5.)"
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