John Henry Twachtman
American Painter
1853-1902
Photograph of John Henry Twachtman
Photographer: Gertrude Käsebier
Gertrude Käsebier was among the first practicing women photographers to gain a level of fame and respect equal to her counterparts in the predominantly male circles of artistic photography. The American photographer first developed her artistic skills relatively later life, after raising three children. She then opened a studio in New York City, where some of her sitters included fellow Pictorial photographers Alfred Stieglitz and Clarence White, with whom she founded the Photo-Secession movement. In 1900 Käsebier became the first woman elected to Britain's Linked Ring Brotherhood.
John Henry Twachtman was an American painter best known for his impressionist landscapes, though his painting style varied widely through his career. Art historians consider Twachtman's style of impressionism to be among the more personal and experimental of his generation. He was a member of "The Ten", a loosely-allied group of American artists dissatisfied with professional art organizations, who banded together in 1898 to exhibit their works as a stylistically unified group.
Twachtman was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and received his first art training there under Frank Duveneck. Like most artists of the era, Twachtman then proceeded to Europe to further his education. He enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich in 1875 and visited Venice with Duveneck and William Merritt Chase. His landscapes from this time exhibit the loosely brushed, shadowy technique taught at Munich. Twachtman also learned etching, and sometimes carried etching plates with him that he could use to spontaneously record a scene.
After a brief return to America, Twachtman studied from 1883 to 1885 at the Académie Julian in Paris, and his paintings dramatically shifted towards a soft, gray and green tonalist style. During this time he painted what some art historians consider to be his greatest masterpieces, including Arques-la-Bataille, in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and Springtime, in the collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum.
Arques-la-Bataille: 1884
During the summer of 1884, Twachtman-then a student at the Académie Julian-rented a château with his family at Arques-la-Bataille, near the port of Dieppe in Normandy, and focused on painting commonplace views of the Arques River valley. Here, he portrayed the edge of the Béthune, a tributary of the Arques, bordered by a fringe of reeds and meadow flowers. In his Paris studio the following winter, he reconsidered the naturalistic sketch and created his monumental canvas Arques-la-Bataille.
Arques-la-Bataille: 1885
Between 1883 and 1885, Twachtman lived in Paris and studied at the Académie Julian. This painting is one of several large landscapes that he painted during these years. Completed from a preliminary oil study, the picture depicts a scene at Arques-la-Bataille, a town four miles southeast of Dieppe, where the Bethune and two other streams flow together to form the Arques River. Its tonal style is reminiscent of both Japanese prints and Whistler's nocturnes.
Springtime: ca 1884
Artist's Home in Autumn-Greenwich, Connecticut: ca 1895
Artist's House-Greenwich, Connecticut: ca 1893
In 1886 he returned to America and settled in Connecticut, eventually buying a farm in Greenwich. He often painted and exhibited with fellow artist Julian Alden Weir, and spent considerable time at the Art Colony in Cos Cob. His presence was vital to the colony:
"Twachtman's temperament--by turns gregarious and introspective, restless and serene--was a major factor in preventing the Cos Cob Art Colony from becoming a backwater of nostalgic complacency. Ironically, his lack of commercial success contributed to his artistic independence, freeing him from the temptation of producing salable pictures according to a proven formula. His art, conversation, and teaching fueled the creative fires of his friends and students in Cos Cob."
In addition to his oil paintings, Twachtman continued to create etchings as well as drawings in pastel. Twachtman taught painting at the Art Students League from 1889 until his death in 1902.
In Connecticut his painting style shifted again, this time to a highly personal impressionist technique. Twachtman painted many landscapes of his Farm and Garden in Greenwich, often depicting the snow-covered landscape. He executed dozens of paintings of a small waterfall on his property, capturing the scene in different seasons and times of day. Late in life Twachtman visited Gloucester, Massachusetts, another center of artistic activity in the late 19th century, and produced a series of vibrant scenes that anticipated a more modernist style yet to gain prominence in American art.
A Garden Path: ca 1897-99
Autumn Mists: ca 1889-1902
Azaleas: ca 1897-99
Barnyard
(Date Unknown)
Twachtman died suddenly in Gloucester of a brain aneurysm, aged 49. Today, his works are in many museum collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Source: Wikipedia
Source: The Athenaeum
Here is some additional biographical material on John Henry Twachtman from The Butler Institute of American Art. Much of it is repetitive but there is further insight which I hope is helpful to at least a few of my readers.
JOHN HENRY TWACHTMAN 1853-1902
John Twachtman was born in Cincinnati. His first artistic efforts were painting floral window shades for his father's business during the day while spending his evenings training at the Ohio Mechanics Institute. In 1874 he studied at the Cincinnati School of Design with Frank Duveneck, who sent him in 1875 to Munich, where he worked with Ludwig von Loefftz at the Royal Academy. In 1877 Twachtman went with Duveneck and William Merritt Chase to Venice. From 1883 to 1885 Twachtman was instructed by Jules Lefebvre and Louis Boulanger at the Academie Julian in Paris, where he was influenced by the paintings of James Abbott McNeill Whistler and the French Impressionists, and became friends with Childe Hassam and Theodore Robinson. Twachtman returned to the United States, and by 1888 had settled in Connecticut where the core of his work was executed. That same year he won the landscape prize for the Society of American Artists, and in 1889, he had a successful two-man show with J. Alden Weir. He acquired property in Connecticut around the time he was hired to teach at the Art Students League. With Weir and Hassam, he helped found the American Impressionist group called The Ten in 1898.
Twachtman's artistic evolution began with a naturalism based on the earth tones and the fluid brushwork he learned from Frank Duveneck and the Munich school, progressing through the muted harmonies and abstract patterning of James McNeill Whistler, and finally comprehending more closely than any other American landscape painter the mature Impressionism of Claude Monet. Twachtman's pictures lack Monet's scale or symphonic fullness, but they emulate some of the Frenchman's subtleties of perception, densely woven color harmonies, built-up impasto, and scumbled, broken brushwork.
Twachtman was notably exceptional, and modern, in the frequency with which his landscape compositions were square or vertical, with a high or even absent horizon line. In contrast to the Dutch and French landscape painters, who commonly structured their pictures around a dominant sky and low horizon, Twachtman, like many other American landscape painters, gives over most of his composition to the land. His works are usually centered around a principal, generally darker, motif which forms a calligraphic flourish and focus, often connected to the picture's diagonal axes. The main marshy mass of Landscape orders the composition more in terms of organic centrifugal outgrowth than of geometrically parallel horizontals. Its somber shape dominates the sloping horizon and vertically sprouts into wiry wintry trees, set against a pale gray sky. Two years after this painting was done, Twachtman wrote to Weir: "I feel more and more contented with the isolation of country life. To be isolated is a fine thing and we are all then nearer to nature. I can see how necessary it is to live always in the country - at all seasons of the year." Twachtman's use of the word "isolation" is instructive, since his works are generally devoid of figures and quite often lack evidence of human habitation. His paintings richly document seasonal change, with fall and, especially, winter, much more frequently depicted than the spring and summer favored by the French Impressionists.
Twachtman was fond of poetry, and loved especially Heinrich Heine. Music was even more of a passion for him, especially the works of Romantics like Johannes Brahms, Frederick Chopin, and Franz Schubert. Taken as qualities, both music and poetry are terms which could be applied to Twachtman's work, full as it is of the atmosphere, harmony, and "color" that characterize the other two art forms. Landscape sings an autumnal lyric of growth and decay, of seasonal death and renewal.
JAMES THOMPSON
Source: The Butler Institute of American Art
Source: John Henry Twachtman Online
Abandoned Mill-Branchville, Connecticut: ca 1888
Aboard a Steamer: 1900-02
Afternoon Shadows: ca 1890-1900
Along the River, Winter: 1887-88
An Early Winter: ca 1882
Artist's Home Seen from the Back: ca 1893-95
Autumn Mists: 1877
Autumn Mists: ca 1889-1902
Avondale, Ohio: ca 1882
Back of Coney Island: ca: 1879-80
Balcony in Winter: ca 1901-02
Bark and Schooner
(aka An Italian Barque): ca 1901
_ca_1901.jpg)
Beach at Squam: ca 1900
Bloody Run: 1882
Boat Landing: ca 1900-02
Boats at Anchor: ca 1900
Boats at Anchor: Date Unknown
Boats at Dieppe: Date Unknown
Branchville: ca 1888-89
Branchville Fields: ca 1888
Bridge in Winter: ca 1901
Bridgeport: ca 1888-89
Brook among the Trees: ca 1888-91
Brook in Winter: ca 1893
Campo Santa Marta: ca 1878
Canal, Venice: ca 1878
Canyon in the Yellowstone: ca 1895
Cascades: ca 1899-1902
Cincinnati Landscape: 1880
Coastal View: 1882
Coney Island, From Brighton Pier: 1879-80
Connecticut Landscape: ca 1889-91
Connecticut Landscape: ca 1890-95
Connecticut Shore, Winter: 1899
Cos Cob: ca 1890-99
Country House in Winter, Cos Cob: ca 1901
Country Path: Date Unknown
Court of Honor, World's Columbian Exposiition: 1893
Dark Trees, Cincinnati: 1882
Dock at Newport: ca 1889
Dredging in the East River: ca 1880
Dutch Landscape: 1885
Edge of the Emerald Pool, Yellowstone: ca 1895
Emerald Pool: ca 1895
Emerald Pool: ca 1895
End of the Pier, New York Harbor: 1879
End of Winter: ca 1890-95
Evening: ca 1881
Falls in January: ca 1895
Farm Scene: ca 1888-91
Figure in a Landscape: ca 1894-96
Fish Sheds and Schooner, Gloucester: 1898
Fishing Boats at Gloucester: 1901
Flower Garden: ca 1890-95
Flower Still Life: ca 1890-99
Flowers: ca 1889-91
Flowers: ca 1891-93
Fog and Small Sailboats: ca 1900
Fountain, World's Fair: ca 1894
From the Upper Terrace: ca 1893-97
Frozen Brook: 1893
Gloucester Boats: ca 1901-02
Gloucester: ca 1900-02
Gloucester Harbor: ca 1900
Gloucester Harbor: ca 1900
Gloucester Harbor: Unknown Date
Gloucester Schooner: 1882
Gloucester Schooner: ca 1900
Gloucester, Fishermen's Houses: ca 1901
Greenwich Garden: ca 1896-99
Harbor Scene: ca 1900
Harbor Scene: ca 1900-02
Harbor View: 1879
Harbor View Hotel: ca 1902
Haystacks at Edge of Woods: ca 1895
Hemlock Pool ca 1894
(aka Autumn)
.jpg)
Hemlock Pool: ca 1900
Holland
(aka Windmill in the Dutch Countryside): 1881
_1881.jpg)
Hollyhocks: ca 1880-89
Hollyhocks: ca 1892
Horseneck Falls: Date Unknown
Horseneck Falls - Greenwich, Connecticut: ca 1890-1900
House in Snow: 1890-94
House on a Canal, Venice: 1877
Icebound: ca 1890-95
In the Garden: 1895-1900
In the Greenhouse: ca 1895
In the Sunlight: ca 1893
Irises: ca 1894-95
Landscape: 1882
Landscape: ca 1888-91
Landscape: ca 1894-96
Landscape: Date Unknown
Landscape: Date Unknown
Landscape, Tuscany: 1880
Last Touch of Sun: ca 1893
L'Etang
(aka The Pond): ca 1884
_ca_1884.jpg)
Little Giant: ca 1900-02
May Morn: ca 1900-02
Meadow Flowers
(aka Golden Rod and Wild Asters): ca 1895
_ca_1895.jpg)
Miami Canal, Cincinnati: 1874
Middlebrook Farm: ca 1888
Moonlight, Flanders: ca 1885
Morning Glory Pool Yellowstone: ca 1895
Mother and Child: 1893
Mother and Child: ca 1897
Mouth of the Seine: ca 1884
My House: ca 1895
Near Paris: ca 1885
New York Harbor: ca 1879
New York Harbor: ca 1889
Newport Harbor: ca 1889
Niagara Falls: 1879
Niagara Falls: ca 1893-94
Niagara Falls: Date Unknown
Niagara Gorge: ca 1890-94
Niagara in Winter: ca 1893-1900
November Haze
(aka Upland Pastures): 1890-99
_1890_99.jpg)
October: 1901
Old Holley House, Cos Cob: 1890-1900
On the Terrace: ca 1897
Oyster Boats, North River: 1879
Paradise Rocks, Newport: ca 1889
Pasture with Barns, Cos Cob: 1899
Path in the Hills - Branchville, Connecticut: 1888-91
Road over the Hill: ca 1890-99
Road Scene: 1878
Sailing Boats, Dieppe Harbor: ca 1883-85
Sailing in the Mist: ca 1895
Sailing in the Mist: ca 1895
San Trovaso Square, Venice: ca 1878
Scene along a Dutch River: ca 1885
Sea Scene: 1893
Ship and Dock, Venice: ca 1878
Snow Scene: 1882
Snow Scene at Utica: ca 1897-99
Snow Scene: Date Unknown
Snowbound: ca 1895-1900
Spring: ca 1890-99
Spring Landscape: ca 1889-91
Spring Stream: Date Unknown
Springtime: ca 1884
Summer Afternoon: ca 1900-02
Summer: ca 1897-99
Summer Landscape: Date Unknown
The Artist's House Through the Trees: ca 1894-95
The Boat Yard: Date Unknown
The Brook - Greenwich, Connecticut
(aka Horseneck Falls - Greenwich, Connecticut): ca 1890-1900
_ca_1890_1900.jpg)
The Cabbage Patch: ca 1890-93
The Campanile, Late Afternoon: Date Unknown
The Cascade: ca 1895-1900
The Cascade in Spring: ca 1890-99
The Chicago World's Fair, Illinois Building: 1893
The Christmas Tree: Date Unknown
The Grand Canal, Venice: 1878
The Hidden Pool: ca 1899
The Inlet: ca 1881
The Landing, Newport: ca 1889
The Ledges: ca 1889-91
The Little Bridge: ca 1896
The Old Mill at Cos Cob: ca 1900-02
The Portico: ca 1897-99
The Rapids, Yellowstone: ca 1895
The Shore: ca 1879
The Summer House: Date Unknown
The Torrent: ca 1900
The Waterfall: ca 1895-1900
The White Bridge: ca 1895-97
The White Bridge: ca 1895-1900
Tiger Lilies: ca 1889-91
Tiger Lilies: ca 1890-95
Tiger Lilies: ca 1893
Tiger Lilies: ca 1896-99
Trees in a Nursery: ca 1889-91
Tuckerman's Ravine: 1873
Tulip Tree, Greenwich: ca 1889-1901
Tuscan Landscape: Date Unknown
Twachtman's House: ca 1889-90
Twachtman's Home - Avondale, Ohio: ca 1882
Under the Wharves: ca 1900
Upland Pastures: ca 1890-99
Venetian Sailing Vessel: 1878
Venice: 1881
Venice: ca 1878
View along a River: ca 1883-85
View from the Holley House: ca 1901
View from the Holley House - Cos Cob, Connecticut: ca 1901
View from the Holley House, Winter: ca 1901
View near Polling: ca 1876-77
View of Venice: 1877
View of Venice: 1878
Waterfall: ca 1895
Waterfall: ca 1898
Waterfall in Yellowstone: ca 1895
Waterfall, Blue Brook: ca 1895-1900
Waterfall, Greenwich: ca 1896-99
Waterfall: ca 1898
Waterfall, Yellowstone: ca 1895
Waterfront Scene, Gloucester: ca 1901
Waterside Scene: ca 1889
Weeds and Flowers: ca 1889-91
Wild Cherry Tree: ca 1901
Wildflowers: ca 1889-91
Winter Harmony: ca 1890-1900
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