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Overview
William Glackens was one of the most influential American painters in the first decades of the twentieth century. From his beginnings as a witty magazine artist-illustrator in Philadelphia and New York to his participation in the forward-thinking group of artists dubbed The Eight, Glackens was a perceptive interpreter of his surroundings. Glackens, one of the most versatile and popular artists of his time, assimilated the lighthearted modern French themes of spirited cafes and bustling parks and resorts in such canvases as "Chez Mouquin" (1905) and "Sledding, Central Park" (1912). An admirer of the more traditional figure painting of the Impressionist Renoir, his name also became closely linked to the modern artists who exhibited their works at the famous Armory Show of 1913, which Glackens helped organize. This important study, the first major monograph on Glackens, includes an essay by Dr. William Gerdts and a complete catalog describing the incomparable holdings of the Glackens Collection of the Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. With a chronology, bibliography, and index, this is sure to become the standard reference on Glackens for historians and collectors of twentieth-century art.Synopsis
William Glackens was one of the most influential American painters in the first decades of the twentieth century. From his beginnings as a witty magazine artist-illustrator in Philadelphia and New York to his participation in the forward-thinking group of artists dubbed The Eight, Glackens was a perceptive interpreter of his surroundings. Glackens, one of the most versatile and popular artists of his time, assimilated the lighthearted modern French themes of spirited cafes and bustling parks and resorts in such canvases as "Chez Mouquin" (1905) and "Sledding, Central Park" (1912). An admirer of the more traditional figure painting of the Impressionist Renoir, his name also became closely linked to the modern artists who exhibited their works at the famous Armory Show of 1913, which Glackens helped organize. This important study, the first major monograph on Glackens, includes an essay by Dr. William Gerdts and a complete catalog describing the incomparable holdings of the Glackens Collection of the Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. With a chronology, bibliography, and index, this is sure to become the standard reference on Glackens for historians and collectors of twentieth-century art.
Publishers Weekly
Glackens (1870-1938) was a leading American impressionist, a great realist figurative painter and a witty chronicler of urban life; all these aspects of his work are on full display in this vibrantly illustrated study. It catalogues the amazing Glackens Collection of the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art, to which Ira Glackens, the artist's son, bequeathed more than 400 of his father's artworks in 1990. The Philadelphia-born painter's mainstream impressionist pictures, made under the influence of Renoir beginning around 1910, look sensuous yet stilted. Much more convincing are his gritty Paris street scenes (1895-1896) and the poetic, magical renditions of ephemeral urban and suburban pleasures made in and around New York City. In his engaging essay, City University of New York art history professor Gerdts, an authority on American impressionism, shows how Glackens's embrace of the incisive Ashcan school realism of The Eight, a group that also included John Sloan and Maurice Prendergast, flowed from his experience as a freelance illustrator and artist-reporter. Santis, the museum's curator, provides selective commentary on individual works. (July)