Noted Mississippi portrait artist Marshall Bouldin dies at age 89

CLARKSDALE, Miss. – Portrait artist Marshall Bouldin III, whose paintings have been displayed in the White House and in more than 400 public and private collections throughout the country, has died. He was 89.

Officials with Meredith-Nowell Funeral Home in Clarksdale, Miss., say Bouldin died Monday at St. Francis Hospital in Memphis, Tenn.

Bouldin was once cited by The New York Times as “the South’s foremost portrait painter.”

He worked on his family’s cotton farm until becoming a full-time portrait artist in 1956. Since then, he has painted the likenesses of more than 800 people, including William Faulkner, Mississippi Gov. William F. Winter, former U.S. House Speaker Jim Wright of Texas and two of President Richard Nixon’s daughters, Tricia and Julie.

Bouldin was the first inductee of the National Portrait Artist Hall of Fame.