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拍品專文
As well known for his landscapes as he was for his still lifes, Martin Johnson Heade dedicated himself to becoming a master of each. Indeed, Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr. tells us, "Heade was unique [among his contemporaries] in giving equal attention to both landscape and still life throughout his career" (The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonne, New Haven, 2000, p. 128).
Among Heade's greatest achievements are his portrayals of a variety of flora, notably the apple blossom, a flower which intrigued him and which he painted for over 30 years. In fact, the Apple blossom was a longer-standing subject for Heade than the Magnolia or the Cherokee Rose, two other flowers he painted and for which he is well known. One of the first still life subjects he encountered, Heade was painting Apple blossoms as early as the mid-1860s, and achieving critical praise in doing so. Indeed, Henry Tuckerman wrote in 1867, after seeing a few of these floral pictures, that Heade had "embodied the very soul of vernal bloom and tenderness in two or threelovely pictures of 'Apple blossoms'" (as quoted in Stebbins, The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonne, New Haven, 2000, p. 128). Barbara Novak adds, "it is fitting that the humble apple-blossom lead the way for Heade's original and powerful contribution to the history of the flower in art" (Martin Johnson Heade: A Survey: 1840-1900, West Palm Beach, Florida, 1996, p. 42).
A Branch of Apple Blossoms and Buds is one of several finished permutations of "a now-unlocated oil sketch of a branch of flowering apple blossoms [which] appears in varying guises in one small painting after another until the early 1880s" (Stebbins, The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonne, New Haven, 2000, p. 128). Stripped of its natural context in the present work by its placement against a gray-toned background, the subject of the painting becomes less the branch itself, and more the composition and effects of light on the surfaces of the leaves and blossoms. The painting serves as a clue to Heade's "pursuit to create a new kind of picture" (Novak, Martin Johnson Heade: A Survey: 1840-1900, West Palm Beach, Florida, 1996, p. 42).
Among Heade's greatest achievements are his portrayals of a variety of flora, notably the apple blossom, a flower which intrigued him and which he painted for over 30 years. In fact, the Apple blossom was a longer-standing subject for Heade than the Magnolia or the Cherokee Rose, two other flowers he painted and for which he is well known. One of the first still life subjects he encountered, Heade was painting Apple blossoms as early as the mid-1860s, and achieving critical praise in doing so. Indeed, Henry Tuckerman wrote in 1867, after seeing a few of these floral pictures, that Heade had "embodied the very soul of vernal bloom and tenderness in two or threelovely pictures of 'Apple blossoms'" (as quoted in Stebbins, The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonne, New Haven, 2000, p. 128). Barbara Novak adds, "it is fitting that the humble apple-blossom lead the way for Heade's original and powerful contribution to the history of the flower in art" (Martin Johnson Heade: A Survey: 1840-1900, West Palm Beach, Florida, 1996, p. 42).
A Branch of Apple Blossoms and Buds is one of several finished permutations of "a now-unlocated oil sketch of a branch of flowering apple blossoms [which] appears in varying guises in one small painting after another until the early 1880s" (Stebbins, The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonne, New Haven, 2000, p. 128). Stripped of its natural context in the present work by its placement against a gray-toned background, the subject of the painting becomes less the branch itself, and more the composition and effects of light on the surfaces of the leaves and blossoms. The painting serves as a clue to Heade's "pursuit to create a new kind of picture" (Novak, Martin Johnson Heade: A Survey: 1840-1900, West Palm Beach, Florida, 1996, p. 42).