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Childe Hassam and Connecticut Impressionism

 

To coincide with the Childe Hassam retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in the summer of 2004, three Connecticut museums are presenting exhibitions on this versatile American Impressionist, who was an influential figure in the art colonies of Connecticut for more than 20 years at the turn of the last century.

The Bush-Holley Historic Site in the Cos Cob section of Greenwich, the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford are focusing on different aspects of Hassam's career and his longtime presence in Connecticut.  Exhibition details follow:

 

Childe Hassam and Connecticut Impressionism
June 11 - October 3
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art
 
Works by Henry Ward Ranger, John Henry Twachtman, Willard Metcalf, Charles H. Davis, and Emil Carlsen, shown alongside paintings and etchings by Hassam, reveal their stylistic shift from the muted tonalism of the Barbizon school to Impressionism.  Comparisons between Hassam's idealized images of women in rural and urban interiors are also highlighted, such as The Goldfish Window (1916) from The Currier Gallery of Art, with The Flag Outside Her Window (1917) that is in the Atheneum's permanent collection.  Organized by Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser, Krieble Curator of American Painting and Sculpture, the exhibition comprises 25 paintings and 25 prints. (right: Childe Hassam (1859 - 1935), The Goldfish Window, 1916, oil on canvas; 33 x 49 inches, The Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, New Hampshire -- Hassam began painting The Goldfish Window at the Holley House in Cos Cob. It is among the major works in Childe Hassam and Connecticut Impressionism at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, June 11 ­ October 3.)

 

Childe Hassam: Impressions of Cos Cob
June 1 - September 5
The William Hegarty Gallery, Bush-Holley Historic Site
The Historical Society of the Town of Greenwich
 
In 1915, during one of his last visits to Cos Cob, Hassam took up etching under the guidance of printmaker Kerr Eby.  In a series of prints Hassam considered his finest, he captured the play of sunlight over boats, barns, and old houses, and portrayed serene women inside the Holley House.  Etchings of Cos Cob subjects by Hassam and Eby are shown in the village where they were created, along with a sampling of the oils, pastels, and watercolors Hassam produced there. (right: Childe Hassam (1859 - 1935), The Mantelpiece, ca. 1914, oil on panel; 14 x 16 inches, Collection of Mrs. Hugh B. Vanderbilt -- This charming oil sketch of a woman before a fireplace in the Holley House is featured in Childe Hassam: Impressions of Cos Cob at The William Hegarty Gallery, Bush-Holley Historic Site, The Historical Society of the Town of Greenwich, June 1 ­ September 5.)
 

 

"A Pretty Fine Old Town": Childe Hassam in Old Lyme
June 5 - September 26
Florence Griswold Museum
 
When Hassam first visited Florence Griswold's boarding house in the summer of 1903, he wrote to J. Alden Weir in Branchville, Connecticut, "Lyme, or Old Lyme as it is usually called, is at the mouth of the Connecticut River and it really is a pretty fine old town."  The exhibition reveals the breadth of Hassam's Old Lyme work in paintings, photographs, letters, and other documents.  A highlight is the painting June (1905) from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.  Never before on public view, this large oil (84 x 84 in.) features three nudes on the banks of the Lieutenant River in Old Lyme. (right: Childe Hassam (1859 - 1935), June, 1905, oil on canvas; 84 x 84 inches
American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York -- This mural-sized oil of three nudes among the mountain laurel bushes on the banks of the Lieutenant River goes on public view for the first time in "A Pretty Fine Old Town": Childe Hassam in Old Lyme, an exhibition at the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, June 5 - September 26.)

 

About the Artist:  

Born in Dorchester, Massachusetts into a family with deep New England roots, Childe Hassam (1859 - 1935) began his career as a commercial illustrator in Boston.  He moved to Paris in 1886 to study at the Académie Julian, and by the following year was painting modern subjects with the high-keyed palette and broken brush strokes of the French Impressionists.  Returning to the United States in 1889, Hassam soon made New York his home base, as did his friend and colleague J. Alden Weir.  Their mutual friend, John Henry Twachtman, taught in New York but lived in Greenwich, Connecticut. 

By 1894 he was visiting Weir and Twachtman in Cos Cob, where they were teaching.  There Hassam painted views of the town's colonial era buildings and picturesque harbor.  After Twachtman's untimely death in 1902, Hassam visited other rural retreats in Connecticut.  In 1903 he joined the Old Lyme Art Colony, which had been founded four years earlier by painter Henry Ward Ranger as a center for Barbizon painting.  Soon after Hassam's arrival, the muted tonalism and realism of the Barbizon school gave way to the brighter palette and looser brushwork of Impressionism.

Although Hassam helped to introduce the advanced style of Impressionism to America, his art celebrated an American past and his own New England heritage.  From landscapes and nautical scenes, to intimate depictions of women and children, and to historic Yankee architecture, these nostalgic images of old New England are more popular today than ever before.

 

Editor's note: RLM readers may also enjoy these articles and essays:

 

Read more articles and essays concerning this institutional source by visiting the sub-index page for the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Resource Library Magazine

Search for more articles and essays on American art in Resource Library. See America's Distinguished Artists for biographical information on historic artists.

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