Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
Friendship Sloop
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: ca. 1927
Dimensions:
42 3/8 × 47 7/8 in. (107.6 × 121.6 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Bequest of Carolyn Wyeth, 1996
Accession number: 96.1.48
Label Copy:
Andrew Wyeth remembered that his father called his paintings in this style "prism paintings." It was the artist’s attempt to depict refracted light and its effect on form. N. C. Wyeth may have seen more radical examples of compositions shattered into triangular and polygonal planes of color in the collection of his friend, the art critic Christian Brinton, but he generally explored the convention in backgrounds, leaving the main subject readily discernable. When it was exhibited in Wilmington in 1934, the local press described the painting as "a blare of color running in ordered riot, as it were, with the outline of a sailing vessel discernible amid the sunshine after a few moments of study."
Andrew Wyeth remembered that his father called his paintings in this style "prism paintings." It was the artist’s attempt to depict refracted light and its effect on form. N. C. Wyeth may have seen more radical examples of compositions shattered into triangular and polygonal planes of color in the collection of his friend, the art critic Christian Brinton, but he generally explored the convention in backgrounds, leaving the main subject readily discernable. When it was exhibited in Wilmington in 1934, the local press described the painting as "a blare of color running in ordered riot, as it were, with the outline of a sailing vessel discernible amid the sunshine after a few moments of study."
Research Number: NCW: 950
InscribedNone
ProvenanceThe artist; Mrs. N. C. Wyeth; Carolyn Wyeth
Exhibition HistoryWilmington, DE, Du Pont Building (O'Toole Offices), (exhibition of Wyeth family work), probably spring, 1934; Chadds Ford, PA, 1995, no. 5, illustration in b/w p. 5; Portland, ME, 2000, no numbers, p. 57; Chadds Ford, PA, 2003
References
Richard Layton , "Inventory of Paintings in the Wyeth Studio, 1950," unpublished, Wyeth Family Archives, p. 79; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, Catalogue Raisonne of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), L.158, p. 751
Curatorial RemarksThe painting is dated by its similarities with NCW 1493. It is mentioned in an undated clipping found in one of Andrew Wyeth's scrapbooks as being exhibited with other Wyeth family work in windows of the DuPont Building, as "a blare of color running in ordered riot, as it were, with the outline of a sailing vessel discernible amid the sunshine after a few moments of study."
The sloop portrayed is "The Venus," owned by Port Clyde lobster fisherman Rodney Davis (Brandywine River Museum, catalogue raisonne files). Andrew Wyeth has identified a ship model made by Rodney Davis in N. C. Wyeth's studio as "The Venus" (see NCWS.95.1527). Rodney Davis and his wife are the subjects of a charcoal-on-canvas drawing by N. C. Wyeth; the sloop appears in the background (see NCW1105).
The sloop portrayed is "The Venus," owned by Port Clyde lobster fisherman Rodney Davis (Brandywine River Museum, catalogue raisonne files). Andrew Wyeth has identified a ship model made by Rodney Davis in N. C. Wyeth's studio as "The Venus" (see NCWS.95.1527). Rodney Davis and his wife are the subjects of a charcoal-on-canvas drawing by N. C. Wyeth; the sloop appears in the background (see NCW1105).
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting