1904 (ca.), Maurice Prendergast, A Dark Day -- American University Museum (Washington)
From the museum label:
Maurice Prendergast was eleven when he and his younger brother Charles James (1863-1948), who also became an artist, moved with their family from their birth city, St. John's, Newfoundland, to Boston. Although he found early employment in Boston with a commercial artist, his approach to art was shaped by his four-year stay in France (1891-1895). In Paris he studied briefly at the Académie Colarossi, but it was while at the Académie Julian that he came to admire the work of Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) and Jean-Édouard Vuillard (1868-1940), who were among a group of Post-Impressionist artists known as Les Nabis. With their brilliantly colored, highly decorative paintings, the Nabis sought to distance themselves from both Academic and Impressionist painting. Their goal was to create works that were personal interpretations of the external world rather than a transcription of nature. Prendergast happily adopted this point of view in his paintings of landscapes and everyday life.
In France Prendergast made numerous sketches of street life. Parisians leisurely strolling in urban parks and groups enjoying themselves in tree-filled settings became familiar themes in his work. The generalized rendering of trees and figures created with small, quick brush strokes in A Dark Day is typical of his approach to painting, although the somber palette is relatively. unique for Prendergast, who is known for his use of brilliant color.
This painting was first shown at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in 1907 in the First Annual Exhibition of Oil Paintings by Contemporary American Artists.
1904 (ca.), Maurice Prendergast, A Dark Day -- American University Museum (Washington)
From the museum label:
Maurice Prendergast was eleven when he and his younger brother Charles James (1863-1948), who also became an artist, moved with their family from their birth city, St. John's, Newfoundland, to Boston. Although he found early employment in Boston with a commercial artist, his approach to art was shaped by his four-year stay in France (1891-1895). In Paris he studied briefly at the Académie Colarossi, but it was while at the Académie Julian that he came to admire the work of Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) and Jean-Édouard Vuillard (1868-1940), who were among a group of Post-Impressionist artists known as Les Nabis. With their brilliantly colored, highly decorative paintings, the Nabis sought to distance themselves from both Academic and Impressionist painting. Their goal was to create works that were personal interpretations of the external world rather than a transcription of nature. Prendergast happily adopted this point of view in his paintings of landscapes and everyday life.
In France Prendergast made numerous sketches of street life. Parisians leisurely strolling in urban parks and groups enjoying themselves in tree-filled settings became familiar themes in his work. The generalized rendering of trees and figures created with small, quick brush strokes in A Dark Day is typical of his approach to painting, although the somber palette is relatively. unique for Prendergast, who is known for his use of brilliant color.
This painting was first shown at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in 1907 in the First Annual Exhibition of Oil Paintings by Contemporary American Artists.