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About William M. Chase
William Merritt Chase was one of America’s highest regarded master painters toward the end of the nineteenth century. Born in Williamsburg (later renamed Ninevah) in southern Indiana, the son of a harnessmaker, Chase rose to become the leader of the progressive Society of American Artists, and his art paralleled the brilliant painterly tradition of Whistler and Sargent. Chase was a student in Munich, where he met Frank Duveneck and was introduced to Courbet’s style through Wilhelm Leibl. He shared the period’s love of Velázquez, one of the original masters of the loaded brush. Chase was critical of the technique of the impressionists, who, in his opinion, over-exaggerated the concept of vibrating atmosphere. Nevertheless, Chase lightened his own palette in the 1880s. He was a inspiring and influential teacher, at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and at his own Shinnecock Summer School of Art on Long Island, opened in 1891. Toward the end of his life, Chase was regarded as a conservative. He could adapt neither to Robert Henri’s rebels, whom he named "The Depressionists," nor to the avant-garde represented at the Armory Show.
The Birthday Party: Helen Velasquez Chase is a portrait of his fifth daughter Helen, born in 1895. Earlier (ca. 1899), Chase, in an homage to Velázquez, painted An Infanta, A Souvenir of Velasquez, also a portrait of Helen (Private collection). Unfortunately for Helen, in that piece of hero worship, Chase added some unflattering facial features of the Hapsburg royalty. Here, on the other hand, is a smiling, somewhat shy little girl caught in a moment of rest at her party, still wearing her festive paper hat. The brushwork, especially the highlights on the pink dress, is as brilliant as one would expect. |
Paintings by William M. Chase
| The Birthday Party: Helen Vasquez Chase |
| oil on canvas, 26 x 21½ inches |
| signed: lower left |
| date: ca. 1902 |
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