At the Seashore

Maurice Prendergast's fascination with the ocean is evident in the serene monotype At the Seashore (CR 1648).  Bands of light blue, deep blue, and silver gray portray, respectively, sky, ocean, and sandy beach.  Its wide expanse is peopled with girls in light summer dresses, accompanied by adults in black who cluster particularly at the water's edge on the right.  What appear to be oblong black balloons float above these figures, opposite a group of seagulls in flight.  A solitary child's balloon ascending from a woman-and-girl pair in the left foreground balances these floating shapes.  The balloons' long strings and the black figures at the water's margin link ocean and shore.

At the Seashore is one of Prendergast's rare dated monotypes, and it belongs to the "Shore Promenade" series.  It combines a reductive approach to composition with linear detail in white, created with the use of a stylus or the end of a brush handle to outline figures and to render balloon strings and decorative spots on dresses.  The image lacks the framing line border with which Prendergast typically finished his monotype compositions, but it includes an inscription with his monogram and the date of the print.  Figures Along the Shore (TF 1992.84, CR 1649), another monotype dated to 1895, features a similar but less complicated vertical composition, with fewer figures and no floating balloons. Both monotypes recall the spare aesthetics of Japanese woodblock prints, which greatly inspired both Prendergast and the American expatriate artist James McNeill Whistler.  Prendergast may well have known Whistler's small seascapes, such as A Freshening Breeze (TF 1992.152) and The Sea, Pourville (TF 1992.158), which share with his own monotypes the effect of parallel bands of subtle color to define a landscape composition. For more information, see Maurice Brazil Prendergast, Charles Prendergast: A Catalogue Raisonné (1990), to which the CR numbers for the monotypes noted above refer.

Monotypes by Maurice Prendergast from the Terra Museum of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois (organizer). Venues: National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., January 27–April 14, 1985; Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois, April 27–June 30, 1985; Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, July 12–September 8, 1985; Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts, September 20–November 17, 1985; Flint Institute of Arts, Flint, Michigan, November 24, 1985–January 19, 1986; Oklahoma Art Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, January 28–February 24, 1986; Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York, May 13–June 15, 1986; Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, June 23–August 24, 1986; Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, Alabama, September 2–October 26, 1986; The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, November 2–30, 1986; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, Minnesota, December 13, 1986–February 15, 1987; Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, Florida, June 21–July 31, 1987; Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, Ohio, August 8–September 27, 1987; Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute, Utica, New York, October 4–November 5, 1987; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, November 15, 1987–January 7, 1988; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, January 20–March 22, 1988; Carnegie Institute, Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, April 9–May 29, 1988. [exh. cat.]

American Treasures: Chase, Whistler and the Prendergasts, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venues: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 26, 1996–January 5, 1997.

Collection Cameo, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, May 2004.

The Eight and American Modernisms, Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois, New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, Connecticut, and Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (organizers). Venues: New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, Connecticut, March 6–May 24, 2009; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, June 6–August 23, 2009. [exh. cat]

Homann, Joachim, Trevor J. Fairbrother, Nancy Mowill Mathews, Joseph J. Rishel and Richard J. Wattenmaker. Maurice Prendergast: By the Sea. (exh. cat., Bowdoin College Museum of Art). Brunswick, Maine: Bowdoin College Museum of Art and DelMonico Books, an imprint of Prestel Publishing, Munich, London and New York, 2013. Text p. 166; pl. 3, p. 37 (color).

Christie's New York, New York (Sale 5712, September 13, 1984): lot 270. Ill. lot 270 (color).

Clark, Carol, Nancy Mowll Mathews and Gwendolyn Owens. Maurice Brazil Prendergast; Charles Prendergast: A Catalogue Raisonné. Munich, Germany and Williamstown, Massachusetts: Prestel-Verlag and The President and Trustees of Williams College, 1990. No. 1648, p. 598; ill. no. 1648, p. 598 (black & white).

Kennedy, Elizabeth et al. The Eight and American Modernisms. (exh. cat., New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT and Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2009. Text pp. 110, 175 (checklist); Ill. p. 121 (color).

Homann, Joachim et. al. Maurice Prendergast: By the Sea. (exh. cat., Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine). New York, New York: Prestel, 2013.

Castle, Susan Forrest. Richard Segalman Black &White: Muses, Magic & Monotypes. New York: The Artist Book Foundation, 2015. ill. p. 18 (color).