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About Edward D. Boit
After graduation from Harvard in 1863, Edward Darley Boit entered the Massachusetts Bar, then moved to Newport, Rhode Island. In 1871, he went to Rome and decided to devote his time to the study of painting. There, he studied under *Frederic Crowninshield, a young but talented muralist and watercolor painter, soon to become an instructor at the *School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Shortly, however, Boit discovered the magnificence of Paris. Kent Ahrens (1890) indicates that Boit was not a student of *Thomas Couture, as one had assumed. Rather, he took instruction from François-Louis Français (1814-1897). Early on, there is the influence of *Corot, whom Boit and Français both admired. Boit’s connection with impressionism was indirect: -- at the height of the development of that movement Boit first met *John Singer Sargent, one of the first sympathizers of the French aesthetic. Boit exhibited his watercolors at the Paris Salon between 1876 and 1888; thereafter some of his works were rejected (1890 and 1891).
Boit remained loyal to his American heritage, though he maintained a home in Europe and traveled frequently between his residence-studio in Paris and Biarritz. In November 1887, Sargent stayed in Boston with Boit at 65 Mount Vernon Street to execute the portrait of Boit’s wife, Mary Louisa Cushing Boit (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston). The fashionable Boston lady, mother of the Boit daughters, whose famous group portrait, also by Sargent (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), had already received acclaim in the Paris Salon of 1883, traveled in style with her artist-husband between Europe and America. In March of 1888, two months before he sailed back to Europe, the *Doll and Richards Gallery in Boston showed seventy-two of his oils and watercolors. Later, in the winter of 1893, Boit had another exhibition, this time of watercolors only, at the *St. Botolph Club. He was prolific in the production of watercolors and oils in the *plein air manner.
Following the effects of his rigid early training under Crowninshield, Boit had succumbed to the spontaneity of impressionists and their *high-keyed palette. In works early in date for any American of the period, Boit was resourceful and uninhibited in his quasi-impressionism. Well before 1895, he revealed a striking awareness of the essence of the impressionist technique, which has been spoken of as "a direct style." Certainly there are reasons for Boit’s turn toward impressionism at a time when the style was not yet completely appreciated in America or in France, for that matter. Mainly, his friendship with Sargent -- a relationship which began in the 1870s -- made Boit quite aware of the daring pictorial innovations of that period. A second reason was Boit’s enthusiasm for the expatriate life in France, which made him susceptible to the challenge of avant-garde art movements. Third, Boit was wealthy; there was no need, no compulsion, for him to paint for a market. Instead, he painted because he wanted to and because he thought of himself as a creative artist who was contributing to the movement of impressionism in general.
One must remain cautious, however, in referring to Boit’s work as impressionistic. Although Boit experimented with the new French style at an early date, he was not always effective in achieving results and his palette, frequently remained somewhat duller than one might expect from someone so close to the plein-air examples of impressionism in France. Although in 1888 a writer called Boit one of Boston’s "cleverest impressionist water-colorists," he was not truly an impressionist when compared to his French counterparts or, even, to many of his American colleagues who sought to paint in Monet’s style. Boit described his working procedure: first he laid in the general composition, then sought to capture the effects of atmosphere. "His use of small patches of bright color, crisply painted and almost abstract in their intensity, is at times reminiscent of *Prendergast" (Fairbrother, 1986-A, p. 201). Boit did display the "interest in specificity of site, climate, and date, common among French and American Impressionist artists" (Gerdts, 1992-B, p. 61). Boit’s Rocky Hillside (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) features a dense patterning of lights and darks that creates a decorative surface, an effect that impressionist painters sought to achieve. After his wife’s death in 1894 Boit married Florence Little and established an Italian summer home called Cernitoio,. Ahrens detects a late watercolor style at Cernitoio. Boit was not fond of exhibiting his works at the national and international venues (*Paris Universal Expositions of 1889 and 1900; 1901 World’s Fair in Buffalo, etc.). He preferred smaller shows, such as the joint exhibition with Sargent in 1909 at Knoedler and Company. The Brooklyn Museum purchased all of Sargent’s works from that show and in 1912, Boit sold thirty-eight of his works to the Boston Museum. For the most part, Boit lived an expatriate life then died in Rome at the age of seventy-five, in 1915, at about the time impressionism lost its momentum to more modern styles. His friend *Henry James called him "a natural grand seigneur of the private life," but somewhat passionless. A year later Henry James himself and *William Merritt Chase would pass away.
REF.
Boit, n.d., "Art in Boston," 1888; An Exhibition of Watercolors by Edward D. Boit, 1893; J.G., 1912; Robert Boit, 1915; Howe, 1967; Soria, 1982, p. 69; Gerdts, 1983, pp. 81-83; Fairbrother, 1986-A, cat. no. 108, p. 201; Brown and Corbin, 1987; Ahrens, 1990; Fink, 1990, pp. 231-233, 322-323; Gerdts, 1992-B, cat. no. 9. |
Paintings by Edward D. Boit
| Looking into the Valley of the Arno, Morning |
| oil on canvas: 22 x 28 1/2 inches |
| signed and dated 1898: lower left |
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