The River

The River is one of several paintings made by John Henry Twachtman during two summers he spent in the French coastal province of Normandy in 1884 and 1885. The work may show scenery along the Béthune or Arques Rivers near the town of Arques-la-Bataille. Framed by dark evergreen trees on the left, the view looks diagonally across the reflective water toward farm buildings and a low ridge in the distance, under a bright but overcast sky. The foreground is scattered with a random array of wildflowers and grasses rendered in brushy strokes and quick dabs of thinly applied pigment. The canvas’s relatively small size and rapid, casual brushwork suggest that it was painted on site. But while Twachtman’s blurry, sketchy technique evokes the sensual experience of the scene—from the texture of the dry grasses to the breezy effect of the windswept sky—it presents the landscape’s tangible components as deliberately vague and undefined. By denying the illusion of exacting representation, The River anticipates Twachtman’s mature art, which is characterized by poetic evocation, introspection, and decorative design.

Twachtman’s two summers in Normandy were interludes in his study at the Académie Julian in Paris. Like many American artists studying in Europe at the time, Twachtman worked to acquire an academic command of draftsmanship and the portrayal of the human figure. His landscape paintings composed during rural summer sojourns, however, concentrated on a freer depiction of nature. Twachtman’s Normandy landscapes of the mid-1880s reveal the artist working through several sources of influence. His masterpiece Arques-la-Bataille (1885; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), another river view, demonstrates his study of the flat, abstract design of Japanese prints; Road near Honfleur (TF 1989.15), also in the Terra Foundation’s collection, is indebted to seventeenth-century Dutch landscape. The River shares the muted color and light of both works, but its casually cropped composition and more active brushwork suggest the influence of the so-called Hague school of Dutch artists, who used subtle nuances of somber tone to create their naturalistic images of humble rural surroundings, and of French impressionism, a movement that used rapid, broken brushstrokes and seemingly unedited framing of the composition to capture everyday, modern subjects. Through these varied sources, Twachtman explored a landscape of mood in which direct observation and on-the-spot portrayal of the scene become only a means to a subjective end.

Exhibition of Paintings by John H. Twachtman, Macbeth Gallery, New York, New York, January 1919, no. 11.

Exhibition of Selected Works by John H. Twachtman, Vose Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts, January 27–February 15, 1919, no. 1.

American Paintings, Watercolors and Drawings from the Collection of Jo Ann and Julian Ganz, Jr., Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, California (organizer). Venue: Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, California, June 23–July 22, 1973.

American Painters in France, 1830–1930, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, June 14–September 3, 1989. [exh. cat.]

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, June 1–November 1, 1992; April 1–October 31, 1993; April 1–October 30, 1994; April 1–October 31, 1995. [exh. cat.]

Ville et campagne: les artistes américains, 1870–1920 (The City and the Country: American Perspectives, 1870–1920), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–July 15, 1999. [exh. cat.]

Artistic Independence in 1898: The Ten American Painters, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, May 4–July 21, 2002.

American Classics from the Collection, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, May 14–June 15, 2003.

A Narrative of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, February 13–October 31, 2004 (on exhibition partial run: September 29–October 31, 2004).

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]

Downes, William Howe. "Twachtman's Landscapes." Boston Transcript (January 29, 1919).

Phillips, Duncan. "Twachtman-An Appreciation." International Studio 66 (February 1919): cvi–cvii. Ill. p. cvii.

McCormick, William B. "Summer Show at Knoedler's Is Devoted to American Art." New York American (July 19, 1923): M-9. Text p. M-9.

Hale, John Douglass. Life and Creative Development of John H. Twachtman. 2 vols. PhD dissertation, Ohio State University, 1957. Text p. 205; ill. p. 206.

Gerdts, William H. et al. Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France, 1865–1915. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1992. Text p. 210; pl. 49, p. 211 (color).

Gerdts, William H. et al. Impressions de toujours: les peintres américains en France, 1865–1915. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1992. Text p. 210; pl. 49, p. 211 (color).

Cartwright, Derrick R. The City and the Country: American Perspectives, 1870–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1999. Text pp. 22, 26 (checklist); fig. 22, p. 19 (black & white).

Cartwright, Derrick R. Ville et campagne: les artistes américains, 1870–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1999. Text pp. 22, 26 (checklist); fig. 22, p. 19 (black & white).

Bourguignon, Katherine and Valerie Reis. The Studio of Nature, 1860-1910: The Terra Collection in Context. (exh. cat, Terra Foundation for American Art with the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny). Paris, France: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2020.  Pl. 42, p. 111 (color).