American Impressionism by William H. Gerdts
folio. pp. 336. 401 illustrations, 204 in colour. bibliography. index. hardcover cloth. dw. (near fine). New York: Abbeville Press, [1984].First Edition.
ISBN-10: 0896594513 / ISBN-13: 9780896594517
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Lavishly illustrated with more than 400 paintings by 125 different artists, this volume contains documentary photographs of the artists and quotations from their private letters and journals complementing the text. Beginning with a brief prelude discussing the roots of Impressionism in America and its relationship to French Impressionism, Gerdts recounts the early adventures of American artists in Claude Monet's village of Giverny, evaluates Impressionism's progress from an avant-garde aesthetic to its triumph during the 1813 Chicago World Fair and its replacement by the radical styles of Cubism and Futurism. Also studies how Impressionism flourished across the United States and includes an exhaustive bibliography. Among the masters reproduced are Childe Hassam, John Twachtman, Edmund Tarbell, and Frederick Frieseke.