TREASURE:
Frederick Childe Hassam (1859-1935)
Beach at Northhampton, 1905
oil on canvas
29-204-1
Childe
Hassam was one of America's leading exponents
of Impressionism. Born in Dorchester,
Massachusetts, he left high school and
pursued a career as an illustrator for
national magazines like Scribners,
and Harpers. Hassam took art
lessons privately, studied and worked
in Paris, and by 1898 was established
as a major American impressionist artist.
In
Beach at Northampton–produced
on the shoreline of Long island–we
see the full flower of his Impressionist
style: minute daubs of paint–contrasting
points of pure color–lit by a bright,
glare of light suffusing sky, flowers
and sand.
TREASURE:
Christopher High Shearer (1846 –
1926)
Smoky Range, Allegheny Mountains, 1894
oil on canvas
13-19-6
Christopher
Shearer was one of Reading’s most
prolific artists. Shearer, who lived and
worked the latter part of his life on
a farm in the Stoudts Ferry Bridge area,
was a friend of Dr. Levi Mengel, the founder
of the Reading Public Museum. Like Mengel,
Shearer was also a naturalist and is said
to have had a collection of more than
35,000 butterflies and moths. Unlike Dr.
Mengel, however, he didn’t take
the precautions necessary to preserve
them, and they are no longer in existence.
Shearer
received formal, European training in
art at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf,
Germany. Later the art center shifted
to Paris and remained there until the
middle of the 20th century.
Shearer
also was a teacher and conducted a workshop
with full time apprentices, much like
the old Masters. One of his students was
another very accomplished Reading artist,
Mary Leisz. Also, Shearer’s two
sons (Victor and Arthur) were students
of his, and they, too, were accomplished.
Later the sons and a cousin opened a studio
of their own. Some of the paintings that
were jointly completed by this group are
signed with the pseudonym S. West,
which they took from the location of their
studio on the southwest corner of 12th
and Windsor Streets in Reading.
This
landscape is the largest painting in the
Reading Public Museum at 96” high
by 192” wide.
TREASURE:
Cyrus Edwin Dallin (1861 – 1944)
Appeal to the Great Spirit, 1912
bronze
27-1986-1
Dallin
was one of the first sculptors to recognize
the plight of the American Indian in his
struggle to retain a place in the expanding
nation. In this piece, the warrior is
shown in despair and praying for guidance.
This particular piece was one of a series
that Dallin created: The Signal of
Peace (1890),
The Medicine Man (1898)
- located in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia,
The Protest (1903),
and finally this Appeal to the
Great Spirit - a life-size bronze is at the Boston Museum of Fine
Arts.
Dallin,
who was born in Utah, studied, as did
many Americans of the time, in Paris at
the Académie Julian. Dallin taught
art and sculpture at the Drexel Institute
in Philadelphia.
TREASURE:
attributed to DE WITT CLINTON BOUTELLE
(1820 - 1884)
COTOPAXI, ECUADOR, 1862
oil on canvas
29-32-1
To
meet the demand for copies of his acclaimed
painting, Frederic Church produced several
paintings of the Ecuadorian volcano, Cotopaxi,
and under pressure to produce prints of
Cotopaxi, Church’s publisher authorized
De Witt Clinton Boutelle to make this
copy. The original Cotopaxi is in the
collection of the Detroit Institute of
Arts.
Boutelle
used Church’s studio to make this
painting. Church retouched the painting
to maintain his high standards before
having it sent to the engraver in Edinburgh.
After the plate was made, the painting
returned to the United States and was
purchased for the Reading Public Museum’s
collection.
Although
entirely self taught, Boutelle was strongly
influenced by the landscapes of the Hudson
River School artists Thomas Cole and Asher
B. Durand. Boutelle was known for his
landscapes, but he also made portraits.
Born in Troy, New York, he painted in
New York, New Jersey and Philadelphia
before moving to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
He was elected an Associate of the National
Academy of Design in 1853 and a member
of the Pennsylvania Academy in 1862.
TREASURE:
JAMES EARLE FRASER
(1876-1953)
END OF THE TRAIL,
1893
bronze
30-447-1
When
displayed at the 1915 Panama - Pacific
Exposition in San Francisco, End of
the Trail
was instantly recognized as one of the
defining images to come out of America's
Western heritage. In despair and submission,
the rider has dropped his lance, bent
his back and bowed his head. His horse,
too, reflects the no longer proud posture
of his master's glorious tradition. By
1893, when End of the Trail
was done, the Sioux had been forced into
Dakota country and all but vanquished
as a nation.
Fraser
was born in Minnesota after that state
became a part of the U.S. He grew up on
the prairies becoming friendly with the
Dakota Sioux and Chippewa (Ojibwa). After
initial studies at the Art Institute of
Chicago, Fraser studied in Paris at the
turn of the century and then worked as
an assistant to Augustus Saint-Gaudens.
His sculpture combines the classical from
and romanticism of the École and
the dignity of Saint-Gaudens with the
directness of Remington. Fraser
is also known for his Indian head and
buffalo, which appeared on U.S. five-cent
coins ("nickels").
TREASURE:
Gilbert Charles Stuart (1755
- 1828)
Portrait of George Washington,
1795
oil on canvas
39-340-1
The
portrait of George Washington by Gilbert
Stuart in the collection of the Reading
Public Museum is one of some 124 portraits
of Washington done by the celebrated American
portraitist.
During
Washington's second term as President,
Stuart was commissioned by Martha Washington
to paint portraits of both Washington
and herself. When Stuart presented his
portraits to Mrs. Washington, she disliked
them and refused to accept them. These
original, unfinished portraits can be
seen in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
The
portraits of George and Martha in Boston
are unfinished because Stuart returned
them to his workshop and discontinued
work on them when they were rejected;
he had painted only their heads. (Portrait
painters like Stuart generally had assistants
working for them who did the rest of the
portrait after the face and head were
finished.) He did, however, use the original
portrait of Washington as a model for
the many more paintings he made of him.
Stuart,
of course, painted portraits of people
other than Washington. But in the end,
he always came back to painting another
Washington. And why were these Washington
portraits so popular? Because people wanted
to buy them to display in their homes
as a visual symbol of their pride in their
new country.
The
Stuart painting in the Reading Public
Museum collection was purchased and donated
to the Museum by Gustav Oberlaender in
February of 1932. This Portrait of
George Washington is known as the
Jonas Miller-Cake-Joseph Stewart Portrait
of Washington because it was passed
from family to family. The original Jonas
Miller received the portrait from an intimate
friend who had purchased it from Gilbert
Stuart.
