The following year, Dow continued his studies in Boston[1] with James M. Stone, a former student of Frank Duveneck and Gustave Bouguereau.

In 1884, he went to Paris for his early art education, studying at the Académie Julian,[3] under the supervision of the academic artists Gustave Boulanger and Jules Joseph Lefebvre.

In 1893, Dow was appointed assistant curator of the Japanese collection at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston under Ernest Fenellosa.

[13] One of his pupils, the educator and printmaker Pedro Joseph de Lemos, adapted and widely disseminated Dow's theories in dozens of theoretical and instructional publications (1918–1950) for art schools.

His ideas were quite revolutionary for the period; Dow taught that rather than copying nature, individuals should create art through elements of the composition, such as line, mass, and color.

The following extracts are from the prefatory chapter "Beginnings" to the second edition of this book (1912): Composition ... expresses the idea upon which the method here presented is founded - the "putting together" of lines, masses and colors to make a harmony.