Guarisco Gallery 2012

79 John Henry Twachtman Am., 1853-1902 Gloucester Harbor signed, o/p 3-1/4” x 22-1/4” 26” x 35” fr. Exhibited: Panama-Pacific Int’l Expo, San Francisco, 1915; M.H. DeYoung Memorial Mus., San Francisco, 1965 Literature: To be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné John Henry Twachtman John Henry Twachtman was one of America’s premier impressionist painters. He received his initial artistic training from Frank Duveneck, with whom he studied in both his native Cinncinnati and abroad in Munich. Twachtman also worked in Paris and was exposed to the practice of painting out-of-doors from which he adopted a light tonalist palette and expressive brushwork. The artist established himself in New York where he taught at the Art Students League and later purchased a farm outside of Greenwich, Connecticut, where he painted soft, tonal land- scapes. Along with J. Alden Weir and Childe Hassam, Twachtman was a founding member of the exhibiting group known as ‘The Ten.’ Gloucester Harbor, located on Massachusetts’ North Shore, was a favorite subject of the American impressionist painters. Twachtman visited Gloucester first in 1891, and thereafter returned many summers. Described by artists as the “Brittany of America,” Gloucester, with its crisp interplay of light, sky, and water lured an increasing number of artists during the late 19th-century. In his mature works of this period, Twachtman continued to employ the light tonal palette of his earlier years, but adopted an even livelier brushstroke. This scene, a view of the harbor from Banner Hill in East Gloucester, is among his most expressive pictures and represents a summation of Twachtman’s Impressionist aesthetic.