death record from familysearch:
Name: George Arthur Hays
Gender: Male
Burial Date: 18 Apr 1945
Burial Place: Pawtucket, R.I.
Death Date: 15 Apr 1945
Death Place: Providence, Providence, Rhode Island
Age: 91
Birth Date: 23 Nov 1853
Birthplace: Greenville, New Hampshire
Occupation: Ret. Artist
Race: White
Marital Status: Widowed
Spouse's Name: Mary Walsh
Father's Name: Thomas Hays
Father's Birthplace: N.H.
Mother's Name: Lucy
Mother's Birthplace: N.H.
∼George Hays was one of Rhode Island's most popular 19th-century artists.
He moved to Providence in 1869 and spent the next 75 years of his life painting prolifically. His works were widely collected. Few of his paintings were painted on site; rather, he evoked the memories of his childhood in New Hampshire. In 1880 he became one of the first members of the Providence Art Club and had his first show there in 1883. In Providence, RI, his studio was at the Woods Building on College Street. Hays was a member of the Providence Art Club, where he exhibited from 1888 to 1940, the Society for Independent Artists, the Copley Society, and the Providence Water Color Club. Self-taught, Hays painted in oils and watercolors and is best known for tranquil landscapes featuring cows and sheep. Records indicate that he painted scenery for "Keith's Circuit," and for Boston's Park Theater in 1887.

His works have an enduring charm, depicting grazing livestock, whether singly or in flocks, in bucolic settings. Stylistically, Hays' works seem to derive their inspiration from the Barbizon School and French animal portraiture, an offshoot of the Barbizon tradition that dignified work animals, imbuing them with a sense of patient endurance and uncomplaining service. Hays often created companion paintings, one of sheep and another of cows, but rarely combined the two animals within the same composition.