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Lot Essay
An esteemed member of the American Impressionist enclave in Giverny, Louis Ritman is best known for his densely patterned, jewel-toned landscapes and interior scenes, often including female figures. Born in Russia, Ritman immigrated with his family to the United States, settling in Chicago around 1900. After beginning his art studies under John Vanderpoel at the Art Institute of Chicago, Ritman embarked for Paris in 1909, and enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and also at the Académie Julian. It was in Paris that he met several American artists including fellow Midwesterners Frederick Frieseke and Richard Miller, both of whom had taken residence in Giverny. In 1911 he began to frequent the art colony that had formed there around Monet's residence, and would return time and again thereafter, often spending his summers in the village.
The Impressionist style of the American artists in Giverny proved a formative influence on Ritman's work; however, the artist ultimately took a direction all his own. Shifting his focus from the Impressionists' characteristic interest in the effects of natural light and atmosphere, Ritman produced dazzling visual effects by saturating entire compositions with bold and abstract patterns, created by the repetitive application of pigment with the brush. Ritman's distinct style in this way may also be linked with the Post-Impressionist artists in fin-de-siècle Paris, who developed a decorative painting style in which lines, forms and patterns were employed for their potential to evoke mood and stimulate emotional responses through visual means, edging further toward pictorial abstraction.
In the present work, executed at the apex of the artist's career, one may see Ritman's interest in the subject that Richard Love has identified as 'intimism,' a favored motif among both his French and American contemporaries: "in terms of pictorial content, the greatest influence in his work at this time was intimisme, the kind exhibited by the Giverny impressionists and the similar French mode: the depiction of an attractive young female in an intimate setting, frequently indoors." (Louis Ritman: From Chicago to Giverny, Chicago, Illinois, 1989, p. 154) Absorbed in domestic activity, the female figure quietly attends to her task without disrupting the overall decorative appearance of the scene--in fact, her boldly striped skirt adds to the striking visual appeal of the painting, and thus renders her yet another decorative element in Ritman's composition. The artist's unique celebration of the vibrant patterns and textures of interior furnishings--wallpaper, upholstery, carpeting, and also costume--set his work apart from the Intimist interiors of his American peers.
The Impressionist style of the American artists in Giverny proved a formative influence on Ritman's work; however, the artist ultimately took a direction all his own. Shifting his focus from the Impressionists' characteristic interest in the effects of natural light and atmosphere, Ritman produced dazzling visual effects by saturating entire compositions with bold and abstract patterns, created by the repetitive application of pigment with the brush. Ritman's distinct style in this way may also be linked with the Post-Impressionist artists in fin-de-siècle Paris, who developed a decorative painting style in which lines, forms and patterns were employed for their potential to evoke mood and stimulate emotional responses through visual means, edging further toward pictorial abstraction.
In the present work, executed at the apex of the artist's career, one may see Ritman's interest in the subject that Richard Love has identified as 'intimism,' a favored motif among both his French and American contemporaries: "in terms of pictorial content, the greatest influence in his work at this time was intimisme, the kind exhibited by the Giverny impressionists and the similar French mode: the depiction of an attractive young female in an intimate setting, frequently indoors." (Louis Ritman: From Chicago to Giverny, Chicago, Illinois, 1989, p. 154) Absorbed in domestic activity, the female figure quietly attends to her task without disrupting the overall decorative appearance of the scene--in fact, her boldly striped skirt adds to the striking visual appeal of the painting, and thus renders her yet another decorative element in Ritman's composition. The artist's unique celebration of the vibrant patterns and textures of interior furnishings--wallpaper, upholstery, carpeting, and also costume--set his work apart from the Intimist interiors of his American peers.