Impressions of Cos Cob

Curator: Susan G. Larkin, Ph.D.
June 1 - September 5, 2004

Childe Hassam, The Steps, 1915, etching. The Collection of the Historical Society of the Town of Greenwich.
To coincide with the Childe Hassam retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York summer 2004, three Connecticut museums presented exhibitions on this versatile American Impressionist, who was an influential figure in the art colonies of Connecticut for more than 20 years at the turn of the last century. The Bush-Holley Historic Site in the Cos Cob section of Greenwich, the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford focused on different aspects of Hassam's career and his longtime presence in Connecticut.

During a visit to Cos Cob in 1915, Childe Hassam turned seriously to etching for the first time. The Impressionist painter had begun his career as an apprentice to a Boston wood-engraver and attempted a few etchings during his first visits to Europe, but never before had printmaking fully commanded his creative energies. His enthusiastic foray into etching at the age of fifty-six was facilitated by Kerr Eby, a printmaker thirty years his junior, who had a press in his studio on Cos Cob's waterfront. With the benefit of Eby's equipment and advice, Hassam created sixty-two etchings in 1915, thirty of them depicting Cos Cob subjects. In that series, which Hassam himself considered his finest; he captured the play of sunlight over boats, barns, and old houses, and portrayed serene women inside the Holley House.

A nearly complete set of Hassam's Cos Cob etchings was shown together for the first time since 1916. Contemporary prints by Eby reveal the mastery he had achieved at the outset of his career. Organized by guest curator Susan Larkin, the exhibition also included examples of the oils, pastels, and watercolors Hassam produced in Cos Cob over more than two decades. Hassam's first recorded visit to Greenwich was in 1894, when he helped his friend and fellow artist John H. Twachtman build an addition to his farmhouse on Round Hill Road. From that time until 1918, Hassam returned often, usually boarding at the Holley House in the Cos Cob section of town. There, he enjoyed the camaraderie of other members of the Cos Cob art colony, especially Twachtman, Theodore Robinson, J. Alden Weir, and Elmer MacRae. Writers including Willa Cather and Lincoln Steffens also frequented the Holley House. Hassam portrayed Cos Cob's artists and villagers in several of his etchings.

Childe Hassam: Impressions of Cos Cob provided unusual insight into the process of printmaking. Visitors to the exhibition had the rare opportunity to compare two impressions of the same image, one on white paper, one on blue. They saw a print unmatted to expose the column of Scriptural text on the "preacher's Bible" paper Hassam sometimes used. Preliminary studies and related images in oil, pastel, and charcoal illuminated the sources of Hassam's inspiration and challenge the assertion that he worked almost exclusively "from nature." A display of etching tools clarified the technical aspect of the printmaker's art.

The Bush-Holley House, inside and out, is the subject of several of Hassam's etchings. In addition to viewing the exhibition in the William Hegarty Gallery, visitors viewed four rooms in the house furnished as they were when Hassam was a frequent guest. Oils, pastels, and etchings by Hassam and other artists hang in the house, which conveys a vivid sense of the art colony period.

This exhibition was funded by Mr. and Mrs. Thomas P. Clephane, Mr. and Mrs. George Crapple, Mrs. and Mrs. Eric C. Fast, Mr. and Mrs. John Townsend III, and a grant from the Xerox Foundation.