Childe Hassam: 10 works

'Hassam was one of a group of American painters who travelled to Paris to learn the new Impressionist style firsthand. This picture was the last he painted in France before returning home to the States.'

'In focusing on the more elegant side of New York life, Hassam equated the city physically to the picturesque capitals of Europe, while also, as Duncan Phillips explained, reflecting the city's "awakening cosmopolitanism..." The arch, sited on Washington Square at the southern end of Fifth Avenue, made clear Hassam's reference to a similar monument, the Arc d'Triomphe in Paris.'

'Drawn with quick, sure strokes and described through contrasting warm and cool tones, The Concord Meadow simultaneously suggests the expanse of grassland framed by a hilly ridge that defines this locale and evokes the fleeting particulars of light, color and atmosphere.Hassam began using pastel in Paris in the late 1880s after seeing it employed to great advantage by the French Impressionists. Like Edgar Degas and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Hassam recognized that the inherent soft texture of the medium was an ideal way to enhance the impressionistic effects he sought.'

'Impressionist Childe Hassam came from an old Massachusetts family that arrived in New England in 1631. After his initial trip to Europe in 1883, Hassam painted Boston streetscapes suffused with poetic mood and atmosphere.'

'Hassam named this study of a nude model, painted as if posed on a cliff, after the siren in the German poet Heinrich Heine's "Die Lorelei" (1827).'

'Subsequent inventories title the Hassam as "The Jewel Box, Old Lyme," prompting questions as to whether the artist returned a different painting.'

'Between 1916 and 1919, Childe Hassam painted more than thirty works collectively known as the "Avenue of the Allies paintings."'

'Moved by the intense emotion and colorful spectacle of the city's Preparedness Day parade in 1916, he began to work on a series of paintings that depicted the flag draped buildings and streets of the country's largest city, a series that would eventually number at least thirty works. Hassam depicted the colorful pageantry that was present along what is most likely an area of Fifth Avenue, looking down from West Forty-ninth Street.'

'Hassam was a close friend of the American sculptress, Anna Hyatt Huntington (1876 - 1973), whose work may be seen today at Brookgreen Gardens (near Myrtle Beech, South Carolina) where she lived and worked. Hassam visited Charleston in 1925 and executed a small group of etchings of popular sites including St. Philip's Church.'

'In Charleston, he executed a small group of etchings of popular sites including St. Philip's Church. His paintings were included annually in exhibitions at the Gibbes from 1906 until his death in 1935.'