|
About Robert W. Vonnoh
As early as 1912, a perceptive writer observed: "It is not often given to one man to excel so pre-eminently in portraiture and landscape work, but Mr. Vonnoh’s peculiar endowments of temperament and versatility have enabled him to achieve distinguished success in each." Since then, however, brighter comets have flashed across the skies of American art history, eclipsing his superb accomplishment. But in spite of this, the writer’s brief summary of Vonnoh’s success remains valid and the quality of his work has lasted over time. Vonnoh was one of the first to assimilate French impressionism and to return with it to his homeland. His art is conservative but sophisticated, and without pictorial theatrics. Even from his earliest application of impressionism, Vonnoh’s imagery reflects the original intentions of the French innovators, compared to better-known artists. This estimate was indirectly pointed out by Vonnoh’s artist-friend Marcel-André Baschet (1862-1941) at an exhibition of Vonnoh’s work at the Galerie *Georges Petit in Paris. In a manner of congratulatory greeting he stated, "Vonnoh, vous connaissez votre métier." Even more important was the fact that Vonnoh practiced and taught his art in America, turning to native *subject matter and imparting his knowledge to numerous students, including *Schofield and *Potthast.
Robert William Vonnoh was born to Frederika and William Vonnoh, both of German lineage. He went with his parents to Boston as a child and attended public schools there. Unlike most artists, young Robert demonstrated no unusual talent in painting or making line drawings. According to one writer, however, Vonnoh entered the scene as an artist at the age of fourteen when the drawing of another boy inspired him to try his own hand at drawing a vase with a crayon. Apparently, art school was not a possibility but he was able to serve as an apprentice in a Boston lithography shop. Soon he must have convinced his mother that art school was his choice over traditional college. At the age of seventeen, he enrolled at the Massachusetts Normal Art
School in Boston and studied under George H. Bartlett (d. 1923) and after two years he made the acquaintance of the precocious *Edmund Tarbell. Vonnoh was appointed instructor of drawing and painting after his graduation in 1879, then was offered a position at the Roxbury Evening Drawing School and also at the Thayer Academy at South Braintree, Massachusetts.
By 1881, Vonnoh sought new artistic inspiration in Europe. In Paris, he became a student at the *Académie Julian under *Gustave Boulanger and *Jules-Joseph Lefebvre. In his daily routine of working in charcoal from the live model, Vonnoh strove to understand and achieve Boulanger’s vague concept of *caractère. He worked on outside class assignments, which included visits to the Louvre. Already in 1883, he was executing landscapes and in the Paris Salon he exhibited the striking portrait, John Severinus Conway (Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Company), called a "really powerful piece of work" in the Boston Evening Transcript (19 January 1884). During his two years in Paris, the French impressionists presented their sixth and seventh group shows, struggling down a stormy road to international fame. Perhaps Vonnoh even had the opportunity to visit Georges Petit’s widely publicized Exposition Internationale, which was begun in 1882, or one of *Durand-Ruel’s several one-man shows for *Boudin, *Monet, *Pissarro, and *Sisley in the spring of 1883.
The spirit of artistic upheaval was in the air when Vonnoh returned to Boston and viewed the *"Foreign Exhibition" held at the Mechanics Building where various impressionist works were seen by many Americans for the first time. Vonnoh accepted the post of principal at the East Boston Evening Drawing School; in 1884 he won his first important exhibition medal from the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association and he taught at the *Cowles Art School around this time (1884-85) where he helped guide the efforts of *Lilla Cabot Perry, who was soon to discover Monet in *Giverny. From the East Boston School, Vonnoh transferred to the *School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1885 to accept a position as the principal instructor of portrait and figure painting (replacing *Frederic Crowninshield). The school was still in its first decade of operation, with *Otto Grundmann on the faculty. This was just before the Tarbell-*Benson era of the Boston School’s history. Vonnoh attempted to incorporate what he learned in the Paris academies. Because of his general interest in French art, Vonnoh went to New York in 1886 to see the outstanding exhibit of French impressionism organized by American Art Association’s *James Sutton, who arranged for Durand-Ruel to provide canvases. Also in 1886, Vonnoh married Grace D. Farrell.
After one more year at the Museum School, Europe beckoned for the second time. Vonnoh spent the next four years (1887-90) mostly in France. One painting from his first year there, entitled La mère bas de soie (El Paso Art Museum) is a profile of a peasant woman wearing a silk stocking around her head; it was described by a critic: "The face, in swarthy tones, stands out sharply against the light ground but between the ground itself, the coif and the blouse there are more minute distinctions, and in bringing out these close values the artist has evidently taken delight." This was a period of transition in American painting as demonstrated by the art of several contemporaries such as *Theodore Robinson, Tarbell, *John Leslie Breck, *Theodore Earl Butler, *Robert Reid, and others who became interested in impressionism and attempted the assimilation of its technique. Vonnoh was one of this group. Having returned to Paris a year after the final group show of the impressionists, Vonnoh found the aesthetic to be far more compelling than during his first study period there. He settled in Grèz-sur-Loing near the Forest of Fontainebleau and along with Edward Potthast, digested the concepts of *plein-air painting, including those of *Bastien-Lepage. His striking Poppies (Indianapolis Museum of Art) shows the influence of Monet and reads as an abstract field of color. Poppies in France, also from 1888 (Private collection) is equally impressive. Vonnoh met *Roderic O’Conor, who came to Grèz in 1884. His bright hues and love of impasto pigment influenced Vonnoh but soon O’Conor would turn to Gauguin’s *post-impressionism in *Pont-Aven.
In 1889, Vonnoh’s Bad News, a genre scene with a woman in distress over an opened letter, and a portrait of a young girl, Phoebe were accepted at the Paris Salon. At the *Paris Universal Exposition, Vonnoh was honored with a bronze medal for a portrait of fellow student John Pinhey, which he called Studio Comrade (*Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts) and Reverie (unlocated). The portrait is still in the early, conservative dark manner but Vonnoh was moving more toward impressionism. The painter stated, "I gradually came to realize the value of first impressions and the necessity of correct values, pure color and higher key, resulting in my soon becoming a devoted disciple of the new movement in painting." By 1890, Vonnoh had learned the basics of the impressionist technique. Eliot Clark (1928) believed Vonnoh painted A Sunlit Hillside, signed and dated 1890 (*National Academy of Design, New York) in Giverny, though the artist’s presence there has not been verified. According to Mae Brawley Hill, a more modern source, this represents a spot in Grèz. Some of the works Vonnoh executed in France were shipped back to Philadelphia in 1889 for a one-man exhibition at the Pennsylvania Academy, scheduled for the following year. One of these masterworks, November, became part of that museum’s permanent collection. The painting appears to have been inspired by Pissarro’s Edge of a Forest near Paris (Rouart Collection), with the village houses seen through a wall of trees. Vonnoh participated in the Paris Salon again in
1890, while Poppies would appear in the Salon of 1891. His Peasant Woman’s Garden (Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago) is one of his most beautiful and impressive impressionist works. Vonnoh is the perfect example of an American painter influenced by impressionism outside of Monet’s realm of Giverny.
Robert Vonnoh returned to America in 1891 to assume the position of principal instructor in portrait and figure painting
in Philadelphia’s Academy. He was honored with a one-man show at the Williams and Everett Gallery in November. But Vonnoh came to the PAFA at a time of transition. The teaching methods of the former director, *Thomas Eakins, had been the focus of great controversy. Now his former student and heir-apparent *Anshutz resumed drawing from plaster casts and abandoned *photography as a teaching aid. Vonnoh helped to introduce aspects of impressionism into an academic setting; therefore, he influenced such painters as *Edward Redfield, *William Glackens, Schofield, and *John Sloan. Jesse Jones (1865-1944), in "Where the Bayberry Grows," made it clear in 1895 that Vonnoh used modern, plein-air methods: ". . . he not only discarded black but all the siennas and the ochres." Other students benefitted from Vonnoh’s skills in precise drawing, perspective, clear effects of light and strength of form, not to mention his bold and vigorous impressionistic brushwork. This was Vonnoh’s most active teaching period. In 1892 he became a member of the *Society of American Artists. At the 1893 *World’s Columbian Exposition, Vonnoh re-exhibited Studio Comrade, Bad News, and November, along with nine other works: a very impressive display of talent. Most progressive is A Peasant Woman’s Garden (mentioned above), painted in 1890, with its predominantly green and violet palette, thickly applied pigment, free and broken brushwork, and brilliant effects of strong sunlight. A year later, *"A Critical Triumvirate" thought larger galleries would show off Vonnoh’s works to better advantage and *Charles Francis Browne called Vonnoh, "one of our strongest men."
From about this period on, however, Vonnoh devoted most of his time to portraiture, particularly of male subjects, in the tradition of *Frederic Porter Vinton. Vonnoh also chose distinguished men of medicine, literature and science. Here he applied a conservative, impressionistic brushwork and retained traditional aspects of portraiture. Eberlein noticed an "ability to see beneath the surface and catch the elusive mental and spiritual expressions of the individual. . . ." Most admirable was Vonnoh’s ability to render the sitter’s hands. In 1896, Vonnoh resigned from his position at the PAFA and began a second phase of his life, which included a great deal of travel between France and America. Three years later, after the death of his wife Grace, Vonnoh married Bessie O. Potter (1872-1955), a sculptor who impressed him with her "quiet absence of eccentricity, of over-emphasis, whether of dress, of manner, or of opinion." Bessie Potter Vonnoh, at this stage in her career, had assisted Lorado Taft at the World’s Columbian Exposition. She was in Paris in 1895, then turned to small-scale genre sculpture, which at least one author has described as impressionistic. Vonnoh’s career seemed to be at its height and gained new momentum within the international art community.
Vonnoh exhibited and received another bronze medal at the *Paris Universal Exposition of 1900 for two portraits and he also served as a member of the jury for the selection of canvases in the American section. That year, he was also elected an Associate of the National Academy. In 1901, Vonnoh received a medal at the *Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, where November reappeared with four portraits. The portrait of his wife was displayed at the National Academy in 1904 and at that year’s *St. Louis Universal Exposition, he showed portraits and two flower paintings. Vonnoh discovered the quiet *artists’ colony at *Old Lyme around 1905, after the impressionists *Childe Hassam and *Willard Metcalf had already re-oriented the aesthetic direction there. Vonnoh seemed to be attracted to a new sense of the *picturesque, compared to his productions at Grèz-sur-Loing. Characteristic is the Pissarro-inspired compositions with leafless
trees in the foreground and an architectural structure in the middleground. Nearing fifty in 1906, Vonnoh was elected full membership at the NAD and once again traveled to France in 1907. He returned to Grèz and led a prolific but tranquil life there for the next four years, maintaining an active role in the American art community.
Vonnoh’s work was included in the *Exhibition of Independent Artists of 1910 and he was given a one-man show in 1911 at the Georges Petit Galleries in Paris, a firm already known for promoting French impressionism. Upon Vonnoh’s return to America in 1912, Eberlein described him as a conservative impressionist. Vonnoh wrote an article himself, which was published in Arts and Decoration. The painter stated how he believed American artists were highly regarded abroad. He continued to produce paintings with lively brushwork, to win honors and medals, and his work was sought by collectors and museums. He and his wife exhibited together at the *Carnegie Institute in 1914, and in the following year, Vonnoh received a gold medal at San Francisco’s *Panama-Pacific International Exposition. Visitors could see his impressive portrait of Daniel Chester French, Bridge at Grèz, Poppies, and Fantasy: Blue and Yellow. In America during the war, Vonnoh began to exhibit his works at Old Lyme and resumed his teaching at the Pennsylvania Academy in composition, landscape, and figure painting. He remained there until 1920; three years later came another solo show, at the Ainslie Galleries in New York, which traveled to Kansas City and Los Angeles. While working at Grèz, Vonnoh experienced worsening eyesight. The year of Monet’s death, 1926, Vonnoh was honored with another one-man exhibition, this time at the Durand-Ruel Galleries in New York. Finally, Vonnoh was unable to paint. He remained in France, however, and died there in the winter of 1933, while America was in its Great Depression.
REF.
A Critical Triumvirate, 1894, pp. 6-7; Ketcham, 1896; Hartmann, 1902, vol. 2, pp. 181, 242, 245; Eberlein, 1912; Vonnoh, 1912; "Robert Vonnoh," 1913; "The Vonnohs," 1914; Art in California, 1916, pl. 136; Vonnoh, 1922; "Vonnoh’s Half Century," 1923; Earle [1924], pp. 322-323; Jackman, 1928, pp. 207-208; Clark, 1932; Domit, 1973, pp. 136-139; Phillips, 1973, vol. 2, pp. 35-36; Boyle, 1974, pp. 136-137; Chambers, 1976, p. 86; In This Academy, 1976, pp. 156-157; Burke, 1980, pp. 329-331; Connecticut and American Impressionism, 1980, pp. 61, 175; Novak and Blaugrund, 1980, pp. 168-171; Quick, 1983, pp. 92-94; Gerdts, 1984, pp. 120-123; Hill, 1986; Hill, 1987; Weber, in Weber and Gerdts, 1987, pp. 15-16; Weinberg, 1991, pp. 242-246; Gerdts, 1992-A, pp. 65-68, 200-204; Gerdts, 1992-B, cat. no. 79; Revisiting the White City, 1993, pp. 340-341; Hill, 1995, pp. 94-99; Love and Marshall, 1999, pp. 92-93. |
Paintings by Robert W. Vonnoh
| Springtime |
| oil on canvas: 12 x 16 inches |
| signed: lower left |
|
| |
Click Picture to Enlarge
|
| Pleasant Valley, Old Lyme |
| oil on canvas:18 x 22 inches |
| signed: lower right |
|
| |
Click Picture to Enlarge
|
| Mystic Summer |
| oil on canvas: 14 x 19 inches |
| signed: lower left |
|
| |
Click Picture to Enlarge
|
|
)
)
)