Recent Arrivals

Insights into historic American artwork newly available from galleries and dealers around the country

Edward Lamson Henry (1841-1919)

Apprehensive

Edward Lamson Henry’s (1841-1919) painting Apprehensive is one in a series of works Henry painted around 1890 showing African American children in school settings in the vicinity of his home in Cragsmoor (Ellenville), New York. The most widely reproduced example from this group is titled Kept In at the Fennimore Museum showing a young African-American girl inside a similar one-room school house while her school mates play during recess outside. The reason for her confinement is not made explicit in the painting but it does not appear to be a happy choice. A painting at the Yale University Art Gallery shows a similar schoolroom in the same area with all white students. Apprehensive, acquired by Thomas Colville Fine Art in Guilford, Connecticut, depicts an African American boy hesitantly entering a school while another Black boy looks anxiously at him from the back of the classroom. This work was formally in the collection of Jack Warner’s Gulf States Paper Corporation and was given the title Tardy as far back as 1962 when it was published in the Kennedy Quarterly. There is no prior record of Henry giving it or another work this title. Because it has a pejorative connotation, Colville has titled it Apprehensive which seems more aligned with the apparent situation of a black child entering a predominately white school. Rural schools in Ulster County, New York, were integrated at this time but black students often encountered what one black parent called “frozen hospitality.” It is not clear whether the boy’s unease, clearly evident on his face, is a result of the atmosphere he has to face in the classroom or from the obstacle of distance he had to overcome in order to get there. In either case, it presents a vivid picture of the discrimination facing African American school-age children as witnessed in E. L. Henry’s New York. Thomas Colville Fine Art is asking $50,000 for the piece.

Thomas Colville Fine Art
111 Old Quarry Road
Guilford, CT 06437 • (203) 453-2449
tlc@thomascolville.com
www.thomascolville.com

Martha Walter (1875–1976)

Women and Children in Anticoli

The American impressionist Martha Walter (1875-1976) was recognized during her extensive career for colorful beach scenes and her depiction of women and children. Recently acquired by Hawthorne Fine Art at auction, Walter’s Women and Children in Anticoli is a major work by the artist and depicts washerwomen with their children returning home after a day of labor. Watercolor sketches executed by the artist during her travels in the Italian hilltop village of Anticoli Corrado just north of Rome likely served as references for the large-scale work. A Philadelphia native, Walter attended the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and studied under William Merritt Chase. In 1908, she was awarded the Academy’s Cresson traveling scholarship and continued her studies in Paris at the Grande Chaumière and the Academy Julian before establishing a studio with like-minded American women artists. Her remarkable talent led to several one-woman exhibitions including the Cincinnati Art Museum (1914), the Galerie Georges Petit Paris (1922) and the Art Club of Chicago (1941). Walter’s work continues to be sought after and today can be found in numerous collections including the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Musée d’ Orsay in Paris and the Musée Du Luxembourg, to name a few. Women and Children in Anticoli will be part of Going Places: Women Artist Travelers of the Early 20th Century, an online exhibition and sale that begins September 13. Hawthorne Fine Art has set an asking price of $18,500 for the piece.

Hawthorne Fine Art
135 E. 57th Steet • New York, NY 10022
(212) 731-0550
infohawthornefineart.com
www.hawthornefineart.com