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拍品專文
Cityscapes, landscapes and interiors with female figures comprise an important part of Childe Hassam's oeuvre; it is, however, scenes of women and flowers that are a genre for which the artist is particularly recognized and which comprise the subject of some of his most memorable images.
In 1886 the artist and his wife settled in Paris where they would remain for the next three years. During this time, he was part of a host of American artists seeking to immerse themselves in the ways of Impressionism. Hassam moved with the intent of "refining his talent in the larger crucible of contemporary art." (D.F. Hoopes, Childe Hassam, New York, 1982, p. 13) While in Paris, Hassam studied at the Académie Julian though his experience at the school was neither favorable nor beneficial to his art. Hassam wrote, "The Julian Academy is the personification of routine...It is nonsense. It crushes all originality out of the growing men." (as quoted in U.W. Hiesinger, Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, New York, 1994, p. 32) Working independently of the Académie, Hassam learned his most important artistic lessons on his own. During this time his style exhibited a subtle shift away from the more static approach evident in his works from his earlier Bostonian period and began to incorporate various tenets of Impressionism.
The Paris that Childe Hassam discovered in the late 1880s was a city of artistic opportunity. During his three-year sojourn, Hassam "opened himself to the broader spectacle of the city's bustling public life. The subjects he chose ranged widely, from the leisurely strolls of the affluent in the bright sunlight of the city's public parks to the nocturnal stirring of crowds shrouded in the evocative mystery of street lights. Often his attention was caught by the everyday scenes that unfolded around him at each street corner or on the newspaper kiosks and bookstalls on the quais. One of his favorite haunts was just a step beyond his door in the winding, steep streets of Montmartre, a quarter peopled with shopkeepers and artisans. There, in an atmosphere more reminiscent of a French rural village than a great metropolis, Hassam roamed purposefully, recording the shop fronts with their colorful displays and the earthy characters who tended their businesses and watched from doorways." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 44)
Childe Hassam, who often chose his subjects from the quieter side of life, was naturally drawn to the lovely flower vendors that populated various sidewalks in Paris. He "found the flower vendors with their gorgeous baskets of merchandise a compelling opportunity to explore color. Hassam not only included figures of flower vendors in his more general street scenes, but developed the subject into a distinct category of his own. [Hassam executed a number of] similar variants of the theme, showing a flower girl proffering her wares at curbside beside a basket loaded with bouquets. [In several of these works, including The Flower Seller], the viewpoints, with passersby cut off by the frame, suggest a random encounter, yet, despite the accidental quality, the restraint and deliberation of the compositions imposes its own sense of abiding significance." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 52) In The Flower Seller, the artist depicts a momentary vignette of a young girl on a street corner of Montmartre dressed in a simple dress and apron offering her flowers to a woman and child emerging from a doorway. Although the flowers in the basket by her side look lush and vibrant, their fleetingness is rendered as leaves and petals fall to the sidewalk. In this work, Hassam juxtaposes the beauty of the flowers with the somberness of the people and neighborhood. "These women [and] their wares afford him an opportunity to capture brilliant color accents in otherwise dull-hued scenes." (H.B. Weinberg, Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, New York, 2004) Energized through Hassam's use of color, light and atmosphere, the work is infused with a restrained sense of movement, indicative of a quieter outlying neighborhood of the city. Applying his inimitable style to an urban view, Hassam brings together the essential elements that came to define his greatest achievements in American Impressionism.
In The Flower Seller, Hassam depicts a light-filled day composed of broadly painted tones of the muted hues of the sidewalks and clothing of the people on the street. From this dominant color scheme emerges the contrasted brilliance of the dabs of reds, pinks, blues and yellows seen in the flowers. Hassam bathes the work with subdued sunlight, an element commonly used by Impressionists to diffuse a scene, which gives form and texture to the figures and their surroundings.
Through a deft handling of composition, the scene which Hassam portrays in The Flower Seller moves beyond a visual record of a day in Montmartre. The scene is viewed from ground level giving it an intimate feel that emphasizes the individuality of the figures and allows Hassam to portray them more distinctively. "Like his fellow American Impressionists, Hassam tended to retain the identity of the subject he painted, instead of dissolving it in an envelope of color in the way of some of the French painters, for example, Claude Monet. In this, he was following a very strong American tradition to particularize and to heighten the reality of the physical world through the painted image." (D.F. Hoopes, Childe Hassam, New York, 1988, p. 9) By individualizing these figures, Hassam is able to draw the viewer in and become part of the scene.
Ulrich Hiesinger offers the following conclusion to Hassam's three-year visit, "On leaving Paris, [he] had every reason to feel satisfied with his accomplishments. He could claim to have undergone the rigors of French academic training, had succeeded in exhibiting at the Salon in each of the three years of his stay--no ordinary feat for a young painter--and capped this by receiving a medal at the Exposition Universelle...Hassam had seen his name and reputation steadily increase at home. He received admiring attention in art journals and press reviews. He had even managed to keep selling his work all the while. If he was still not well known, let alone famous, he had certainly moved far beyond the small world of Boston to join the international ranks of professionals worthy of serious attention." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 58)
Combining his past interest in urban scenes with a new and unique painting technique, The Flower Seller represents an important stylistic development in Hassam's career. A reviewer in 1910 noted that "although Mr. Hassam is the American representative of French Impressionism, his works reflect the strong personality of their creator. It is true that he studied his technique in France, where his personal vision was much more enlarged, but he remains himself always and his poet's soul receives its inspiration solely from nature." (Childe Hassam, p. 9)
This watercolor will be included in Stuart P. Feld's and Kathleen M. Burnside's forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist's work.
In 1886 the artist and his wife settled in Paris where they would remain for the next three years. During this time, he was part of a host of American artists seeking to immerse themselves in the ways of Impressionism. Hassam moved with the intent of "refining his talent in the larger crucible of contemporary art." (D.F. Hoopes, Childe Hassam, New York, 1982, p. 13) While in Paris, Hassam studied at the Académie Julian though his experience at the school was neither favorable nor beneficial to his art. Hassam wrote, "The Julian Academy is the personification of routine...It is nonsense. It crushes all originality out of the growing men." (as quoted in U.W. Hiesinger, Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, New York, 1994, p. 32) Working independently of the Académie, Hassam learned his most important artistic lessons on his own. During this time his style exhibited a subtle shift away from the more static approach evident in his works from his earlier Bostonian period and began to incorporate various tenets of Impressionism.
The Paris that Childe Hassam discovered in the late 1880s was a city of artistic opportunity. During his three-year sojourn, Hassam "opened himself to the broader spectacle of the city's bustling public life. The subjects he chose ranged widely, from the leisurely strolls of the affluent in the bright sunlight of the city's public parks to the nocturnal stirring of crowds shrouded in the evocative mystery of street lights. Often his attention was caught by the everyday scenes that unfolded around him at each street corner or on the newspaper kiosks and bookstalls on the quais. One of his favorite haunts was just a step beyond his door in the winding, steep streets of Montmartre, a quarter peopled with shopkeepers and artisans. There, in an atmosphere more reminiscent of a French rural village than a great metropolis, Hassam roamed purposefully, recording the shop fronts with their colorful displays and the earthy characters who tended their businesses and watched from doorways." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 44)
Childe Hassam, who often chose his subjects from the quieter side of life, was naturally drawn to the lovely flower vendors that populated various sidewalks in Paris. He "found the flower vendors with their gorgeous baskets of merchandise a compelling opportunity to explore color. Hassam not only included figures of flower vendors in his more general street scenes, but developed the subject into a distinct category of his own. [Hassam executed a number of] similar variants of the theme, showing a flower girl proffering her wares at curbside beside a basket loaded with bouquets. [In several of these works, including The Flower Seller], the viewpoints, with passersby cut off by the frame, suggest a random encounter, yet, despite the accidental quality, the restraint and deliberation of the compositions imposes its own sense of abiding significance." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 52) In The Flower Seller, the artist depicts a momentary vignette of a young girl on a street corner of Montmartre dressed in a simple dress and apron offering her flowers to a woman and child emerging from a doorway. Although the flowers in the basket by her side look lush and vibrant, their fleetingness is rendered as leaves and petals fall to the sidewalk. In this work, Hassam juxtaposes the beauty of the flowers with the somberness of the people and neighborhood. "These women [and] their wares afford him an opportunity to capture brilliant color accents in otherwise dull-hued scenes." (H.B. Weinberg, Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, New York, 2004) Energized through Hassam's use of color, light and atmosphere, the work is infused with a restrained sense of movement, indicative of a quieter outlying neighborhood of the city. Applying his inimitable style to an urban view, Hassam brings together the essential elements that came to define his greatest achievements in American Impressionism.
In The Flower Seller, Hassam depicts a light-filled day composed of broadly painted tones of the muted hues of the sidewalks and clothing of the people on the street. From this dominant color scheme emerges the contrasted brilliance of the dabs of reds, pinks, blues and yellows seen in the flowers. Hassam bathes the work with subdued sunlight, an element commonly used by Impressionists to diffuse a scene, which gives form and texture to the figures and their surroundings.
Through a deft handling of composition, the scene which Hassam portrays in The Flower Seller moves beyond a visual record of a day in Montmartre. The scene is viewed from ground level giving it an intimate feel that emphasizes the individuality of the figures and allows Hassam to portray them more distinctively. "Like his fellow American Impressionists, Hassam tended to retain the identity of the subject he painted, instead of dissolving it in an envelope of color in the way of some of the French painters, for example, Claude Monet. In this, he was following a very strong American tradition to particularize and to heighten the reality of the physical world through the painted image." (D.F. Hoopes, Childe Hassam, New York, 1988, p. 9) By individualizing these figures, Hassam is able to draw the viewer in and become part of the scene.
Ulrich Hiesinger offers the following conclusion to Hassam's three-year visit, "On leaving Paris, [he] had every reason to feel satisfied with his accomplishments. He could claim to have undergone the rigors of French academic training, had succeeded in exhibiting at the Salon in each of the three years of his stay--no ordinary feat for a young painter--and capped this by receiving a medal at the Exposition Universelle...Hassam had seen his name and reputation steadily increase at home. He received admiring attention in art journals and press reviews. He had even managed to keep selling his work all the while. If he was still not well known, let alone famous, he had certainly moved far beyond the small world of Boston to join the international ranks of professionals worthy of serious attention." (Childe Hassam: American Impressionist, p. 58)
Combining his past interest in urban scenes with a new and unique painting technique, The Flower Seller represents an important stylistic development in Hassam's career. A reviewer in 1910 noted that "although Mr. Hassam is the American representative of French Impressionism, his works reflect the strong personality of their creator. It is true that he studied his technique in France, where his personal vision was much more enlarged, but he remains himself always and his poet's soul receives its inspiration solely from nature." (Childe Hassam, p. 9)
This watercolor will be included in Stuart P. Feld's and Kathleen M. Burnside's forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist's work.