Champ de blé

Charles Harold Davis’s Champ de blé presents a newly harvested and almost cleared wheat field sloping upward toward a pale, overcast sky. A few long golden stalks litter the ground, its green expanse varied by yellow, white, and red wildflowers; similarly, a flock of distant birds, actually mere spots of dark paint, punctuate the blank whiteness of the sky. Just off-center, an abandoned wheelbarrow bearing a small mound of grain emphasizes the landscape’s deserted state. A swath of uncut wheat on the left and a small stand of trees on the right relieve the flat horizon, which cuts off a view of the landscape beyond. Intimate in scale and painted with rough, evident brushstrokes, this seemingly unedited record of a simple, unpretentious rural scene appears to have been painted largely on-site.

The artist may have inscribed the canvas “Paris” because he finished and thus signed it there. However, Champ de blé probably was painted in the vicinity of Fleury-en-Bière, a village in France not far from Barbizon, site of a colony of landscape painters. Since his days as an art student in Boston, Davis had admired the moody, romantic rural landscape paintings of the so-called Barbizon school. On his arrival in France, the young American visited the area that had inspired them, and he soon settled there to devote himself to landscape painting. Fleury’s flat, open countryside reminded him of the tidal marshlands near his native Amesbury, Massachusetts. Such quiet scenery was the template on which Davis created a landscape art of poetic evocation that proved perennially popular among his contemporaries.

Impressions de toujours: les peintres américains en France, 1865–1915 (Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France, 1865–1915), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–October 31, 1993. [exh. cat.]

Giverny: une impression américaine (Giverny, An American Impression), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–November 1, 1998.

Ville et campagne: les artistes américains, 1870–1920 (The City and the Country: American Perspectives, 1870–1920), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venues: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–July 15, 1999; Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, December 10, 1999–May 7, 2000 (in modified form). [exh. cat.]

American Artists in France, 1860–1910, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, March 10–June 3, 2001.

D'une colonie à une collection: le Musée d'Art Américain Giverny fête ses dix ans (From a Colony to a Collection: Celebrating the Tenth Anniversary of the Musée d'Art Américain Giverny), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, March 30–June 16, 2002.

Le Passage à Paris: les artistes américains en France, 1860–1930 (Passing through Paris: American Artists in France, 1860–1930), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, April 1–October 31, 2005. [exh. brochure]

Le Passage à Paris: les artistes américains en France, 1860–1930 (Passing through Paris: American Artists in France, 1860–1930), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, April 1–October 29, 2006. [exh. brochure]

Charles Harold Davis, Mystic Impressionist, Bruce Museum, Greenwich, Connecticut (organizer). Venue: Bruce Museum, Greenwich, Connecticut, September 26, 2015–January 3, 2016. [exh. cat.]

The Studio of Nature, 1860-1910: The Terra Collection in Context (L’atelier de la Nature, 1860-1910. Invitation à la Terra Collection). Terra Foundation for American Art with the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny (organizers). Venue: Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny, France, September 12, 2020–January 3, 2021. [exh. cat. in French]