Birge Harrison (American, 1854–1929) | Snow Scene

Project Description

Description: Oil on canvas, 61 x 51.4 cm. Signed 'Birge Harrison' (lower right)Catalogue note: Lovell Birge Harrison was a landscape painter, teacher, and writer. He was a prominent practitioner and advocate of Tonalism. Harrison studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in the United States and at the École des Beaux-Arts under French painter, Alexandre Cabanel, in Paris.
The artist admired the work of the French impressionists but expressed reservations about their use of intense colours. He was more responsive to the quieter, evocative style of the Barbizon school, with its more romantic concept of nature, and became known for his poetic depictions of winter landscape. Harrison then spent several years abroad, travelling through Europe, Australia and the Middle East. On his return, he founded the Woodstock School in New York, where he taught landscape painting during the summer to members of the Art Students League. He preferred to paint winter scenes that showed the landscapes of the northern states and Canada, using subdued colours to express the effects of light on landscapes of snow and ice.
Provenance: Acquired from Christie’s, Sale 16470, Lot 182, Invoice no. DB18011793. Private collection, Palm Beach, Florida.| Acquired by the present owner from the above
Catalogue no.: 2018P0123-BH