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John Henry Twachtman Catalogue Raisonné
An online catalogue by Lisa N. Peters, Ph.D., in collaboration with the Greenwich Historical Society

Catalogue Entry

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Additional Images
The Rapids, Yellowstone, ca. 1895 (OP.1309). Fig. 1. Gardner River, Yellowstone National Park. Postcard #1262. Yellowstone National Park: Hamilton Stores Inc. Photograph by James Blank. Personal collection of Tamsen Hert.
Fig. 1. Gardner River, Yellowstone National Park. Postcard #1262. Yellowstone National Park: Hamilton Stores Inc. Photograph by James Blank. Personal collection of Tamsen Hert.
The Rapids, Yellowstone, ca. 1895 (OP.1309). Fig. 2. Yellowstone National Park, north on Route 89, along the Gardner River, 2013 (from google maps).
Fig. 2. Yellowstone National Park, north on Route 89, along the Gardner River, 2013 (from google maps).
Keywords
OP.1309
The Rapids, Yellowstone
Alternate titles: Colorado, Yellowstone Series; Colorado—Yellowstone Series; Grand Cañon in Winter; Grand Canyon in Winter; Rapids in the Yellowstone; Rapids, Yellowstone; Rapids, Yellowstone Park; The Rapids; The Rapids—Yellowstone
ca. 1895
Oil on canvas
30 x 30 1/8 in. (76.2 x 76.5 cm)
Stamped lower left: Twachtman Sale [1903 estate stamp]
Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts (1917.13)
Provenance
(American Art Galleries, New York, Twachtman estate sale, March 24, 1903, no. 81, as Colorado—Yellowstone Series);
to Edward A. Rorke, Brooklyn;
(Silas S. Dustin, New York);
to Alexander C. Humphreys, New York, 1908;
to (American Art Association, New York, Humphreys sale, February 14–15, 1917, lot 142, as Rapids in the Yellowstone);
to (Macbeth);
to present collection, 1917.
Exhibitions
1896 Society of American Artists probably
American Fine Arts Society, New York, Eighteenth Annual Exhibition, Society of American Artists, March 28–May 2, 1896, no. 180, as Grand Canyon in Winter.
1903–I American Art Galleries
American Art Galleries, New York, Sale of the Work of the Late John H. Twachtman, exhibition and auction, March 19–24, 1903, no. 81, as Colorado—Yellowstone Series.
1913 Lotos Club
Lotos Club, New York, Exhibition of Paintings from the Collection of Dr. Alexander C. Humphreys, October–November 1913, no. 70, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
1914 Carnegie Institute
Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, Exhibition of Paintings by Dr. Alexander C. Humphreys of New York City, February 21–June 23, 1914, no. 142, as The Rapids—Yellowstone.
1919–II Vose
R. C. & N. M. Vose, Boston, Exhibition of Paintings by J. H. Twachtman, November 10–22, 1919, no. 5, as The Rapids.
1920 Detroit Institute of Arts
Detroit Institute of Arts, Sixth Annual Exhibition of Selected Paintings by American Artists, April 20–May 31, 1920, no. 161, as The Rapids—Yellowstone.
1966 Cincinnati Art Museum
Cincinnati Art Museum, John Henry Twachtman: A Retrospective Exhibition, October 7–November 20, 1966. (Exhibition catalogue: Baskett 1966); (Exhibition catalogue: Boyle 1966–I), no. 76, as Rapids, Yellowstone, lent by the Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts.
1985 Danforth Museum of Art
Danforth Museum of Art, Framingham, Massachusetts, The Ten American Painters: An Impressionist Tradition, May 5–June 30, 1985, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Literature
Critic 1896 probably
"Exhibition at the Society of American Artists." Critic new series 25 (April 11, 1896), p. 261, as Grand Cañon in Winter.
New York Times 1896 probably
"Society of American Artists: The Landscapes." New York Times, April 4, 1896, p. 4, as Grand Cañon in Winter.
Sun 1903–II
"Twachtman Pictures, $16,610." Sun (New York), March 25, 1903, p. 5, as Colorado, Yellowstone Series.
Worcester Art Museum Bulletin 1917
"Worcester Art Museum." Bulletin 8 (October 1917), pp. 49 ill. in b/w, 50, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
American Art Association 1917–I
The Very Notable Collection Formed by Dr. Alexander C. Humphreys, President of the Stevens Institute. Auction catalogue, February 14–15, 1917. New York: American Art Association, 1917, lot 142 ill. in b/w, as Rapids in the Yellowstone.
Worcester Art Museum 1922
Catalogue of Paintings and Drawings. Worcester, Mass.: Worcester Art Museum, 1922, p. 208, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Cheney 1941
Cheney, Sheldon. The Story of Modern Art. New York: Viking, 1941, p. 435 ill. in b/w, as Rapids, Yellowstone Park.
Hale 1957
Hale, John Douglass. "Life and Creative Development of John H. Twachtman." 2 vols. Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University, 1957. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms, 1958, vol. 1, pp. 258–60 ill. (fig. 53); vol. 2, p. 580 (catalogue A, no. 764), as Colorado, Yellowstone Series. (Hale concordance).
Cheney 1958
Cheney, Sheldon. The Story of Modern Art. Revised and enlarged edition. New York: Viking, 1958, p. 433 ill. in b/w, as Colorado, Yellowstone Series.
Boyle 1979
Boyle, Richard. John Twachtman. New York: Watson-Guptill, 1979, pp. 62–63 ill. in color, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Broder 1984
Broder, Patricia. The American West: The Modern Vision. Boston: Little, Brown, 1984, p. 15 ill. in b/w, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Peters 1995
Peters, Lisa N. "John Twachtman (1853–1902) and the American Scene in the Late Nineteenth Century: The Frontier within the Terrain of the Familiar." 2 vols. Ph.D. dissertation, City University of New York, 1995. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International, 1996, vol. 1, p. 377; vol. 2, p. 921 ill. in b/w (fig. 407), as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Brigham 1997–II
Brigham, David R. American Impressionism: Paintings of Promise. Worcester: Worcester Art Museum, 1997. Exhibition catalogue, pp. 19–20, 84 ill. in color, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Peters 2024
Peters, Lisa N. "John Twachtman: An American Impressionist's Yellowstone." Montana: The Magazine of Western History 74 (Autumn 2024), pp. 16 ill. in color, 22, as The Rapids, Yellowstone.
Commentary

This was possibly the painting exhibited at the Society of American Artists in the spring of 1896 with the title of Grand Cañon in Winter. A review in the Critic stated that the work on view gave “no indication of the scale of the scenery and might as well represent a raving in Ulster County.” The New York Times observed: “Mr. Twachtman’s agreeable color sense has rarely been better demonstrated than in his ‘Grand Cañon in Winter’ wherein the artist, keeping his tones very high, has, nevertheless, achieved much brilliancy of opalescent qualities with his pigment, and produced a delicate harmony.”

Despite this titling, the work's site has recently been identified as a view in Montana on the Gardner River (fig. 1).[1] The locale is situated in Yellowstone, just north of Boiling Hot Springs  and a few miles north of Mammoth Hot Springs. Twachtman's perspective appears to be looking northwest where the volcanic ridges formed sharp peaks. Due to the snow cover, near and far hills and a distant mountain peak (probably in the Gallatin Range) are compressed into a unified continuous curve carried throughout the design. This perspective was made possible by Twachtman's low vantage point, which makes the river appear to rise upward and rush forward out of view. Today the site can be accessed from US89, which is on the east side of the river (fig. 2).

In Yellowstone, the snow clung to the surfaces of the rocks and to hills that were bare of vegetation regardless of the time of year. Twachtman used slashing strokes in a rapid style of painting matching the subject, while emphasizing the range of whites that united the land on both sides of the river. He appears to have made liberal use of titanium white tints to produce the opalescense observed by the New York Times critic.  

The painting was included in the artist’s 1903 estate sale, as Colorado—Yellowstone Series, from which it sold to Edward A. Rorke (1856–1905), a Brooklyn artist who was one of the show’s major purchasers. After Rorke’s death, it was sold through Silas Dustin (1851–1927), the agent for Twachtman’s estate, to Alexander C. Humphreys, a Scottish-born nationally known water-gas engineer, who was present of the Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, New Jersey, and an avid collector of American paintings. 

[1] I would like to thank Tamsen Leigh Hert, until recently head, Emmett D. Chisum Special Collections, University of Wyoming Librarian, for her help in identifying this site, email correspondence, January 2023.