Collection Online as of January 27, 2023
Niagara Falls
William Morris Hunt
(American, 1824–1879)
Charcoal and brush and charcoal wash; framing lines in charcoal
Support: Beige(2) laid paper
Sheet: 27.5 x 42.9 cm (10 13/16 x 16 7/8 in.); Image: 26.7 x 42.1 cm (10 1/2 x 16 9/16 in.)
Gift of Mrs. G. Tappan Francis 1943.326
Location
not on view
Description
Hunt studied with the famous French painter of peasant scenes, Jean-Francois Millet (1814–1875), and played a major role in introducing the loose brushwork of advanced French painting into American art. In 1878, only a year before his tragic suicide, Hunt visited Niagara Falls. There he produced a remarkable group of pastels, charcoal drawings, and paintings in which the physical particulars of the scene appear to dissolve into a near-abstract pattern of water and mist.