Catalogue Entry
This is presumably the pastel shown as Willows in Twachtman’s 1886 solo exhibition at J. Eastman Chase’s Gallery in Boston. A reviewer for the Boston Evening Transcript described the work on view as a “study of willows” that was charming. A pastel with the title Willows again received attention when Twachtman included it in the second exhibition of the Society of Painters in Pastel in 1888. The New York Times stated: “‘Willows’ is full of soft, dry, green foliage and of long grass in which weeds are flowering.” The Art Amateur called Willows “a capital study in gray, green and brown.” Also in 1888, Willows was among the eleven works Twachtman sent to the sixteenth annual Inter-State Exposition in Chicago. There a critic for the Daily Inter-Ocean called it “somber enough to frighten the wits out of the elf child as he nestles in his father’s arms.”
It was probably this pastel that was also included, as Willows, in the sale of the work of Twachtman and Julian Alden Weir, held February 7, 1889 at the Fifth Avenue Art Galleries. It was listed in the show's catalogue with measurements of 13 x 19 1/2 inches. The height measurement does not match this work, but perhaps it was printed in error. No other pastels by Twachtman that are known depict this subject.
The work is likely to be among the pastels Twachtman created in Holland in the summer of 1885, when he began to explore the medium in the company of William Merritt Chase and Robert Blum. His stylistic method here concurs with a time when he used pastels with the fluidity of oil, blending hues for tonal effects, such as the nuanced greens that fill this scene.