"The Old House, Connecticut"

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(1915)

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"The Old House, Connecticut" 1915, drypoint on cream laid paper, 162x193mm; 6 1/2" x 7 5/8", full margins. Signed with the cypher and inscribed "imp." in pencil, lower right.  Edition of 10, plate destroyed. A very good impression of an extremely scarce print [Cortissoz/Clayton 40].

"The test of the painter-etcher is his ability to do with the needle what he can do with the brush, to carry over into a black and white art something of the quality which is characteristic of his work in color, to be he himself, in other words, though he may change his wonted instrument. It is his meeting of this test the vitalizes Mr. Hassam's plates" - Royal Cortissoz

Frederick Childe Hassam (1859-1935) was born in Boston.  He was the son of a prosperous Boston merchant and avid antiquarian, among whose sizable collection of antiques the young Childe Hassam spent his youth. His formal art training began under I. M. Gaugengigl.  After working for a short time as an illustrator and painter, he continued his studies at the Academie Julian in Paris under Boulanger and Lefebvre until 1883.  During his five years in France, Hassam was influenced by the prismatic dissolutions of Monet, an influence that was to make him one of the leading exponents of American Impressionism.

In the summer and fall of 1915, Childe Hassam began an extraordinary period of printmaking, producing sixty-two etchings. Over the next two decades, Hassam created a lifetime total of 380 etchings, many of which are graphic art masterpieces.  He focused on the same subjects for his graphic works as he did in other media and was successful in the creation of Impressionist light in a black and white medium. He was masterful in his ability to capture the patterns of sunlight filtering through foliage and dissolving into abstract geometric impressions, while giving a direct representation of the subject.  Hassam was capable of transmuting into black and white the body and subtlety of color, the beauty of design and pervasiveness of light through brief fine web-like strokes of the etcher's needle. Beginning etching at the age of 56, Childe Hassam proceeded to create a body of graphic works that can be characterized as a tour-de-force of American masterpieces in black and white.

This scarce Childe Hassam drypoint is in a 20 7/8" x 21 3/4" frame. The pyramid shaped frame with rounded raised lip is aged with red/silver and metallic leaf undertone, textured highlights and refinished to expose streaking, cracking and voids.  The Larson-Juhl "Craig Ponzio" charcoal wood fillet echoes the frame.  The outer khaki linen, middle white silk and inner tan Beveled-Accent mats are acid and lignin free and are protected with Acrylite-AR OP3 (UV) by CYRO .... $8000.00