Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
Henriette in the Orchard
Alternate Title(s):Harriet in the Orchards
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: ca. 1909-1910
Dimensions:
25 1/8 × 30 1/8 in. (63.8 × 76.5 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Gift of Ruth A. Yerion, 1980
Accession number: 80.2.4
Label Copy:
Historically, this painting has been known in the Wyeth family as "Henriette in the Orchard," thus identifying the figure of the child as Wyeth's oldest daughter, Henriette (b.1907). The orchard was part of the Chadds Ford farm the Wyeths rented from April 1908 through March 1911. After purchasing his own land in 1911, Wyeth worried that four-year old Henriette’s budding sense of place would be disrupted. He wrote to his mother, "She had become used to the old place...she knew where the first violets appeared (she had visited the patch up in the orchard a number of times…in great anticipation); its pathways and byways were part of her tiny instinct. All these things were taken away from her, and she must begin over again." Wyeth’s deeply personal identification with the Chadds Ford landscape was becoming more and more intense, and he would nurture a similar sense of place in all his children.
With its impressionist brushwork and pastel palette, the painting is part of a group of local landscape views that Wyeth executed between 1909 and 1912.
Historically, this painting has been known in the Wyeth family as "Henriette in the Orchard," thus identifying the figure of the child as Wyeth's oldest daughter, Henriette (b.1907). The orchard was part of the Chadds Ford farm the Wyeths rented from April 1908 through March 1911. After purchasing his own land in 1911, Wyeth worried that four-year old Henriette’s budding sense of place would be disrupted. He wrote to his mother, "She had become used to the old place...she knew where the first violets appeared (she had visited the patch up in the orchard a number of times…in great anticipation); its pathways and byways were part of her tiny instinct. All these things were taken away from her, and she must begin over again." Wyeth’s deeply personal identification with the Chadds Ford landscape was becoming more and more intense, and he would nurture a similar sense of place in all his children.
With its impressionist brushwork and pastel palette, the painting is part of a group of local landscape views that Wyeth executed between 1909 and 1912.
Research Number: NCW: 367
InscribedLower right: N. C. WYETH (underlined); label on reverse bears the painting's title and the words "Lent by Ruth A. Yerion."
ProvenanceThe artist; Mrs. N. C. Wyeth (with Knoedler Galleries, New York, NY, 1956 inventory # 54839/CA 7268); Ruth A. Yerion to 1980
Exhibition HistoryNew York, NY, 1957, no. 13; Southampton, NY, 1966, no numbers; New York, NY, Coe Kerr Gallery, "A Tribute to American Realism, The Collection of Amanda K. Berls and Ruth A. Yerion," Jan. 7-31, 1976, illus. as "Harriet in the Orchards," unpaginated; Chadds Ford, PA, 1980, no. 76, also ps. 36, 63; Chadds Ford, PA, 1992; Chadds Ford, PA, 1997, no numbers; Chadds Ford, PA, Brandywine River Museum, "N. C. Wyeth and The Philadelphia Sketch Club," March 20 - May 23, 2010; Kalamazoo, MI, Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, "The Wyeths, America's Artists," Jan. 15-April 17, 2011; Doylestown, PA, James A. Michener Art Museum, 1/20/- 5/6/2018 (and Roswell, NM, Roswell Museum and Art Center, 6/15 - 9/16/2018), "Magical & Real, Henriette Wyeth and Peter Hurd," checklist, vol. 1, p. 106, and p. 3, illus. in color;
References
Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, Catalogue Raisonne of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), L.38, p. 712
Curatorial RemarksHistorically, this painting has been known in the Wyeth family as "Henriette in the Orchard," thus identifying the figure of the child as Wyeth's oldest daughter Henriette (b.1907). The orchard was part of the Chadds Ford farm the Wyeths rented from April 1908 through March 1911.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting
Photo Credit:No credit on transparency