Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
Sitter:
John McGinley
Nightfall
Alternate Title(s):Night Fall
Medium: Tempera on hardboard
Date: 1945
Dimensions:
32 1/16 × 40 1/16 in. (81.4 × 101.8 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Bequest of Bequest of Helen and John Kenefick, 2019
Accession number: 2019.3
Label Copy:
Nightfall is the last of the monumental tempera paintings that occupied Wyeth in the 1940s before his unexpected death. It is a dark painting, literally and figuratively. It suggests the emotional strain of a tragedy experienced by a local farmer, but beneath this narrative is the artist’s own dark mood at the time, fueled, as his letters indicate, by anxiety related to the ongoing war and deep-rooted concern for his own artistic legacy. Painted with masterful control (look, for example, at the slouch of the farmer’s hat over his ear, or the rendering of the farmer’s shirt), Nightfall may also represent a form of competition with his son Andrew, whose reputation by the early 1940s was increasingly firmly established.
Research Number: NCW: 128
InscribedLower left: N. C. WYETH; (no indication that panel is a Renaissance Panel)
ProvenanceThe artist; Mrs. N. C. Wyeth to 1956 (and with Knoedler Galleries, New York, NY); Mr. Robert F. Woolworth, New York, NY, 1957-1972; Private collection, 1972-1975; (Coe Kerr Gallery, New York, NY)
Exhibition HistoryPittsburg, PA, Carnegie Institute, 1945, no. 26, as "Nightfall," illustration in b/w plate 58 (installation photo, Brandywine River Museum library); "Farm House Scene is Public's Choice," Hagerstown, MD, The Daily Mail, Dec. 7, 1945, p. 10; Wilmington, DE, 1946, no. 4; Washington, DC, 1946, no. 2; New York, NY, 1946, no. 2, as "Night Fall"; Wilmington, DE, Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts, "Twenty-Three American Painters, Their Portraits and Their Work 1815-1945," Oct. 7 - Nov. 4, 1956, no. 23; New York, NY, 1957, no. 25; Harrisburg, PA, 1965, no. 118, illustration in color (unpaginated); Chadds Ford, PA, 1972, no. 136; Chadds Ford, PA, 1982, no. 28, p. 36, illustration in b/w p. 34; Princeton, NJ, Art Museum, Princeton University, "In Celebration, Works of Art from the Collections of Princeton Alumni and Friends of The Art Museum. . . ," Feb. 22 - June 8, 1997, no. 273, illustration in color, p. 292, also p. 256; Chadds Ford, PA, Brandywine River Museum of Art, June 22-Sept. 15, 2019 (and Portland, ME, Portland Museum of Art, Oct. 4, 2019-Jan. 12, 2020, and Cincinnati, OH, Taft Museum, Feb. 8-May 3, 2020), "N. C. Wyeth: New Perspectives," illus. p. 201
References
"The Home Forum," Christian Science Monitor, Dec. 21, 1945, illustration in b/w; ______, "The People's Choice," Carnegie Magazine, vol. XIX, no. 7 (Jan. 1946), p. 209; ______, "N.C. Wyeth--A Veteran Illustrator: In Memoriam," Art News, vol. XLIV, no. 19 (Jan. 15 - 31, 1946), illustration in b/w p. 14; ______, "N. C. Wyeth," Life Magazine, vol. 20, no. 24 (June 17, 1946), illustration in color p. 80; Henry C. Pitz, "N. C. Wyeth," American Heritage, vol. XVI, no. 6 (Oct. 1965), illustration in color p. 50; Betsy James Wyeth, ed., The Wyeths, The Letters of N. C. Wyeth, 1901-1945 (Boston: Gambit, 1971), p. 842, illustration f. p. 832; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1972), illustration in color on dust jacket, color illustration p. 189; Wanda M. Corn, The Art of Andrew Wyeth (Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, 1973), illustration in b/w p. 131; George H. Straley, "Remembrance of N. C. Wyeth," Susquehanna Magazine, May 1982, illustration in b/w p. 35; M. Stephen Doherty, "N. C. Wyeth Centennial Exhibition," American Artist Magazine, Aug. 1982, illustration in b/w p. 75; Andrew Wyeth, "N. C. Wyeth," in An American Vision Three Generations of Wyeth Art (Boston: New York Graphic Society, Little, Brown and Co., 1987), p. 85 and illustration in b/w p. 28 (measurements incorrect); Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, Catalogue Raisonne of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), P.61, p. 828, 829
Curatorial RemarksIn a letter to Henriette Wyeth Hurd dated Dec. 10, 1944, the artist referred to this as his "McGinley panel." John McGinley was a Chadds Ford farmer; the little girl is drawn from the artist's imagination. In a later letter to Henriette, Wyeth wrote, "Well, I've put the last day I'll have for some time on my "John McGinley"....I don't think I have ever enjoyed doing a picture so much, nor have I ever concentrated so intensively." (Betsy James Wyeth, ed., p. 842). An archival photograph of the painting at the Carnegie Institute in 1945 shows the framing selected for the exhibition (Brandywine River Museum library). The painting won third prize in the Carnegie exhibition by popular vote.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting
Photo Credit:Brandywine River Museum photo files
On view