Childe Hassam: Impressionist in the West

2004

In 1904 and 1908 the American Impressionist, Childe Hassam, visited Oregon and the surrounding region to try his hand at capturing the varied landscapes of the West. Over a period of several months he traveled throughout the state and into Washington, Idaho, and northern California painting over 60 images including landscapes, seascapes, portraits, and still lifes. Childe Hassam: Impressionist in the West brings together some 30 paintings from these trips, together with a selection of other images by Hassam, to explore the relationship of the western paintings to Hassam's overall body of work.

Childe Hassam made his first trip to Oregon in August of 1904 at the invitation of Charles Erskine Scott Wood, a prominent Portland attorney who was also a well-known author, a talented painter, and a discerning art collector. Wood is thought to have been introduced to Hassam through their mutual friend, the artist J. Alden Weir. Wood commissioned Hassam to decorate his library for which Hassam created a brightly colored mural of nude bathers along a river. Once the mural was completed, Hassam and Wood spent time on the Oregon coast and in eastern Oregon, as well as southwestern Idaho and southern Washington; Hassam also visited Seattle and San Francisco before returning to New York in late September.

Hassam returned to Oregon in the fall of 1908, this time for an extended visit to Portland (where he painted a number of portraits and scenes from the Willamette Valley), as well as the Harney Desert in eastern Oregon with C.E.S. Wood. Hassam was enraptured by the abundant wildlife, broad open spaces, and endless skies of this remote region of Oregon. When Wood could convince him to take time off from hunting and fishing, Hassam painted a number of images—ranging from sketches on cigar box lids to finished oils—that celebrated its unique landscape. As he did after his 1904 journey, Hassam also created other works with western subjects from notes and sketches after he returned to his New York studio including a colorful vignette of Portland's Chinatown.

Hassam's 1904 and 1908 trips to the Northwest are an intriguing, and under-investigated, interlude in his career. As a young painter, Hassam began what became a pattern of painting trips to interesting regions, generally during the summer months. A number of these excursions resulted in groups of work that explored the landscape of a particular region in depth, such as the Isles of Shoals off the coast of New Hampshire and Gloucester, Massachusetts. In some regards, the Oregon paintings share aspects of these other groups of work—an interest in the color and texture of rock formations, for example, seen in both the Isles of Shoals works as well as his paintings of the Oregon coast and Harney Desert. Other characteristics suggest a response unique to the sights and colors of the west, such as the low horizon lines and expansive skies common in his Oregon landscape compositions.

Childe Hassam: Impressions of the West explores in depth Hassam's oils, watercolors, and pastels of Oregon and other parts of the region. The exhibition includes earlier paintings by Hassam, as well as east coast work from the period of his Oregon trips and paintings from his 1913 California visit in order to compare and contrast his approaches to these subjects. A group of paintings by C.E.S. Wood address Wood's relationship with Hassam and the impact of Hassam's interpretation of the regional landscape on Wood's own paintings. The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue.

Curated by Margaret Bullock