The Cherry Tree (The Cherry Blossoms)

The gnarled, yet elegant cherry tree provides a brilliant subject for American Impressionist William Chadwick. Blooming for a brief few days each April, the cherry tree’s crooked trunk is an asymmetrical framework, which Chadwick furiously filled with dabs of pastel-tinged paint. As in nature, the flurry of blossoms burst forth from the painting. Chadwick honed his plein air painting talents in art colonies such as Old Lyme, Connecticut, where he and many other American Impressionists found idyllic landscape subjects in the plentiful blooms of laurel, dogwood, and cherry trees.