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拍品專文
Childe Hassam’s paintings from his summers along the New England coast are renowned for their vivacious depictions of quaint resort communities, their visitors, the sparkling sea and the flourishing flora. Incorporating all of these elements into one panoramic work, Gloucester Harbor superbly captures one of the most inspiring views of the region in the effervescent Impressionist style that earned Hassam the nickname of the 'American Monet.'
With beautiful coastal vistas and a burgeoning maritime industry, Gloucester, Massachusetts, has long proved an inspirational summer destination for generations of American artists, from Fitz Henry Lane and Martin Johnson Heade to Winslow Homer and Edward Henry Potthast. Hassam first visited Gloucester as a young artist around 1880. Once he moved to New York in 1889, the town became a convenient stop on the way to summers he spent on Appledore in the Isles of Shoals, with Hassam visiting at least five times in the 1890s. He typically stayed in East Gloucester at hotels like the Hawthorne Inn, which was conveniently located only a few miles from the center of town via an electric tram and provided a great view of the harbor. He would also coordinate his visits with other artists; for example, he traveled with Willard Leroy Metcalf to Gloucester in the summer of 1895. It was on these summer painting campaigns at the lively artist colonies on Appledore and in Gloucester that Hassam perfected his plein-air Impressionist style.
Hassam's early depictions of Gloucester focused on the bustling townspeople and the flurry of activity surrounding the marina. Near the turn of the century, however, following two productive and stylistically innovative European sojourns, Hassam's depictions of this seaside town shifted towards the overall landscape visible from his East Gloucester viewpoint. Ulrich Hiesinger notes, “It was during this visit [of 1899] that Hassam began to envision the Gloucester landscape in a fundamentally new way, replacing fragmentary incidents and scenery with enduring realities expressed in sweeping panoramas of the harbor and town. These have come to be regarded as his quintessential Gloucester views, unrivalled for their breadth, complexity and delicate atmospheric effect.” (Childe Hassam, New York, 1994, p. 122)
Gloucester Harbor of 1899 epitomizes this new aesthetic direction, rendering the scene in faithful detail and expressive brushwork. Oswaldo Rodriguez Roque writes, “It was on Banner Hill…that Hassam painted this view of the harbor and town of Gloucester. By this time his Impressionist style had matured, as can be seen in the broken brushwork that captures the general effect of sparkling sunlight in the painting. Still, his representation of the physical features of the town in this work is a highly realistic one.” The present work depicts several specific church spires scattered around the City Hall clock tower in the center of the painting. Roque continues, “The body of water in front of these distant buildings is Gloucester’s Inner Harbor. The central area is Rocky Neck, where the chimney of a power plant for the Marine Railways provides a secular vertical accent. A number of boats are seen in the middleground, in a part of the harbor known as Smith’s Cove. Most prominent in the view, however, is the house at 245 East Main Street, not far from where the painter John Sloan resided in the summers between 1914 and 1918. (Directions in American Painting, 1875-1925: Works from the Collection of Dr. and Mrs. John J. McDonough, exhibition catalogue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, p. 36)
Gloucester offered Hassam the ability to escape from the oppressive and mundane life of the city and allowed his mind to wander and retreat into the depths of his own imagination. By fully manifesting these introspective journeys onto canvas, he offers viewers of his Gloucester pictures a similar passage. Hassam's first biographer Adeline Adams remarked, “How he loved the whole New England coast, with its endless variety of sand, pebbles, and towering granite!...To many an attentive eye, the familiar Hassam magic has altered and enhanced the Gloucester scene, the Provincetown scene, the Newport scene. Those places transcended their former selves, because the invisible had been made visible through the painter's art.” (Childe Hassam, New York, 1938, p. 94)
Ernest Haskell similarly wrote in 1922, “Before I had seen Hassam’s pictures, [Gloucester] seemed a fishy little city, now as I pass through it I feel Hassam. The schooners beating in and out, the wharves, the sea, the sky, these belong to Hassam. Just as one cannot go to Venice and be very far from Whistler.” (Distinguished American Artists: Childe Hassam, New York, 1922, p. viii) The transportive quality of Hassam’s Gloucester works is largely derived from his Impressionist concentration on the clear light of summer and its prismatic reflections off the water and landscape. The panorama of Gloucester Harbor unquestionably attests to Hassam’s place among the best in the long line of American artists who have found inspiration in Gloucester’s classic New England summer views and equally affirms his position among the highest echelon of Impressionist painters.
With beautiful coastal vistas and a burgeoning maritime industry, Gloucester, Massachusetts, has long proved an inspirational summer destination for generations of American artists, from Fitz Henry Lane and Martin Johnson Heade to Winslow Homer and Edward Henry Potthast. Hassam first visited Gloucester as a young artist around 1880. Once he moved to New York in 1889, the town became a convenient stop on the way to summers he spent on Appledore in the Isles of Shoals, with Hassam visiting at least five times in the 1890s. He typically stayed in East Gloucester at hotels like the Hawthorne Inn, which was conveniently located only a few miles from the center of town via an electric tram and provided a great view of the harbor. He would also coordinate his visits with other artists; for example, he traveled with Willard Leroy Metcalf to Gloucester in the summer of 1895. It was on these summer painting campaigns at the lively artist colonies on Appledore and in Gloucester that Hassam perfected his plein-air Impressionist style.
Hassam's early depictions of Gloucester focused on the bustling townspeople and the flurry of activity surrounding the marina. Near the turn of the century, however, following two productive and stylistically innovative European sojourns, Hassam's depictions of this seaside town shifted towards the overall landscape visible from his East Gloucester viewpoint. Ulrich Hiesinger notes, “It was during this visit [of 1899] that Hassam began to envision the Gloucester landscape in a fundamentally new way, replacing fragmentary incidents and scenery with enduring realities expressed in sweeping panoramas of the harbor and town. These have come to be regarded as his quintessential Gloucester views, unrivalled for their breadth, complexity and delicate atmospheric effect.” (Childe Hassam, New York, 1994, p. 122)
Gloucester Harbor of 1899 epitomizes this new aesthetic direction, rendering the scene in faithful detail and expressive brushwork. Oswaldo Rodriguez Roque writes, “It was on Banner Hill…that Hassam painted this view of the harbor and town of Gloucester. By this time his Impressionist style had matured, as can be seen in the broken brushwork that captures the general effect of sparkling sunlight in the painting. Still, his representation of the physical features of the town in this work is a highly realistic one.” The present work depicts several specific church spires scattered around the City Hall clock tower in the center of the painting. Roque continues, “The body of water in front of these distant buildings is Gloucester’s Inner Harbor. The central area is Rocky Neck, where the chimney of a power plant for the Marine Railways provides a secular vertical accent. A number of boats are seen in the middleground, in a part of the harbor known as Smith’s Cove. Most prominent in the view, however, is the house at 245 East Main Street, not far from where the painter John Sloan resided in the summers between 1914 and 1918. (Directions in American Painting, 1875-1925: Works from the Collection of Dr. and Mrs. John J. McDonough, exhibition catalogue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, p. 36)
Gloucester offered Hassam the ability to escape from the oppressive and mundane life of the city and allowed his mind to wander and retreat into the depths of his own imagination. By fully manifesting these introspective journeys onto canvas, he offers viewers of his Gloucester pictures a similar passage. Hassam's first biographer Adeline Adams remarked, “How he loved the whole New England coast, with its endless variety of sand, pebbles, and towering granite!...To many an attentive eye, the familiar Hassam magic has altered and enhanced the Gloucester scene, the Provincetown scene, the Newport scene. Those places transcended their former selves, because the invisible had been made visible through the painter's art.” (Childe Hassam, New York, 1938, p. 94)
Ernest Haskell similarly wrote in 1922, “Before I had seen Hassam’s pictures, [Gloucester] seemed a fishy little city, now as I pass through it I feel Hassam. The schooners beating in and out, the wharves, the sea, the sky, these belong to Hassam. Just as one cannot go to Venice and be very far from Whistler.” (Distinguished American Artists: Childe Hassam, New York, 1922, p. viii) The transportive quality of Hassam’s Gloucester works is largely derived from his Impressionist concentration on the clear light of summer and its prismatic reflections off the water and landscape. The panorama of Gloucester Harbor unquestionably attests to Hassam’s place among the best in the long line of American artists who have found inspiration in Gloucester’s classic New England summer views and equally affirms his position among the highest echelon of Impressionist painters.