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International Art Treasures Web Magazine November 2005 |
American ImpressionsAn Arcadian Vision
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The turn of the 20th Century brought European influences on a group of American artists wanting to focus away from the gritty urban center to an Eden of natural beauty of landscapes, garden scenes and female beauty. American Impressionism explores this key time in the development of the American artists. |
Title: On the Balcony, 1912-1915,
Artist: Frederick C. Frieseke (American 1874-1939)
Medium: Oil on Canvas,
Permanent Collection: Akron Art Museum
Bequest of Edwin C. Shaw
Image Courtesy: The Taft Museum of Art
American was barely a century old and Europe was considered the center for artistic group and development. Many of the artists in this exhibit traveled to the old world for inspiration it wasn't always found. In 1877 an Impressionist exhibition was found by Julian Alden Weir to be "worse than a Chamber of Horrors." It was the forceful brush strokes and high-keyed colors that were anathema to some of the artists viewing the works. Weir adapted what he saw with softer hues and smaller brush strokes placing his own mark on this new style. This was common for American artists of the day to resist the influence and then make their own mark on this creating what has come to be known as American Impressionism.
Title: Through the Vines, ca 1908
Artist: Frederick C. Frieseke (American 1874-1939)
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Permanent Collection: Akron Museum of Art,
Gift of Mr. S.G. Carkhuff
Image Courtesy: The Taft Museum of Art
Through the Vines is a powerful use of flecks of primary colors falling across a woman enjoying the day.
Title: Bedford Hills
Artist: Frederick Childe Hassam (American 1859-1935)
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Bequest of Edwin C. Shaw
Image Courtesy: The Taft Museum of Art
Bedford Hills is an example of Impressionistic techniques with the use of green, blue and yellow to illustrate the play of sun in the landscape. Hassam was one of the earliest to fall under the spell of the Impressionists and use their techniques in his own work.
The Ten
"Ten American Painters" or "The Ten" exhibited together for two decades beginning in 1898 after they resigned from the Society of American Artists believing it to be too conservative and too unwieldy an exhibition group. Six of the members are in this exhibit Julian Alden Weir, Childe Hassam, Willard Metcalf, John Twachtman, William Merritt Chase and Thomas Wilmer Dewing. The Ten were dedicated to promoting the then newer styles of Impressionism.
Thirty-five paintings will form American Impressions at the Taft Museum of Art.