John Henry Twachtman Catalogue Raisonné
An online catalogue by Lisa N. Peters, Ph.D., in collaboration with the Greenwich Historical Society
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Additional Images
Bridge in Winter, ca. 1901–02 (OP.1513). Fig. 1. Frank Seymour, the Palmer & Duff Shipyard as seen looking north from the Holley House, Cos Cob. Archives, Greenwich Historical Society, Greenwich, Connecticut.
Fig. 1. Frank Seymour, the Palmer & Duff Shipyard as seen looking north from the Holley House, Cos Cob. Archives, Greenwich Historical Society, Greenwich, Connecticut.
Keywords
OP.1513
Bridge in Winter
ca. 1901–02
Oil on canvas
30 1/8 x 30 1/8 in. (76.5 x 76.5 cm)
Signed lower left: J. H. Twachtman–
Private collection
Exhibitions
1908 Wentworth Manor
Wentworth Manor, Montclair, New Jersey, American Paintings: Collection of William T. Evans, November 1908, no. 134, as Bridge in Winter.
1910 Royal Academy of Art in Berlin
Königliche Akdemie der Künste zu Berlin, Austellung Amerikanischer Kunst, March 1910, as Bridge in Winter.
1910 International Exhibition, Munich
Munich, International Exhibition, May 1910, as Bridge in Winter.
1910 Lotos Club
Lotos Club, New York, Exhibition of Paintings by French and American Luminists, December 17, 1910 and following days, no. 45, as Bridge in Winter, lent by William T. Evans.
1911 Wentworth Manor
Wentworth Manor, Montclair, New Jersey, American Paintings: Collection of William T. Evans, February 1911, no. 145, as Bridge in Winter.
1913 American Art Galleries
American Art Galleries, New York, The Private Collection of American Paintings Formed by the Widely Known Amateur William T. Evans, Esq. of New York, March 31–April 2, 1913, no. 131, as Bridge in Winter.
1914 New Haven Paint and Clay Club
New Haven Paint and Clay Club, Connecticut, Thirteenth Annual Exhibition, April 8–26, 1914, no. 93, as Bridge in Winter, lent by Mr. Burton Mansfield.
1920 Wadsworth Atheneum
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut, Exhibition of Paintings, Pottery, and Glass Loaned by the Hon. Burton Mansfield of New Haven, April 13–November 1, 1920, no. 30, as Bridge in Winter.
1989–II National Gallery of Art
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., District of Columbia, John Twachtman: Connecticut Landscapes, October 15, 1989–January 28, 1990. (Exhibition catalogue: Chotner 1989); (Exhibition catalogue: Pyne 1989); (Exhibition catalogue: Peters 1989–I), no. 24, p. 112 ill. in color, as Bridge in Winter. Traveled to: Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut, March 18–May 20, 1990.
1999 High Museum of Art
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, John Henry Twachtman: An American Impressionist, February 26–May 21, 2000. (Peters 1999–I), no. 55, pp. 150, 154 ill. in color, as Bridge in Winter. Traveled to: Cincinnati Art Museum, June 6–September 5, 1999; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, October 16, 1999–January 2, 2000.
2001 National Academy of Design
National Academy of Design, New York, The Cos Cob Art Colony: Impressionists on the Connecticut Shore, February 13–May 13, 2001. (Larkin 2001–I), as Bridge in Winter. Traveled to: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, June 17–September 16, 2001; Denver Art Museum, October 27, 2001–January 20, 2002.
Literature
American Art Association 1913
Private Collection Formed by the Widely Known Amateur William T. Evans. Auction catalogue, March 3–April 2, 1913. New York: American Art Association, 1913, lot 131 ill. in b/w, as Bridge in Winter.
New American 1913
"Sale of Evans Pictures: Art Event of the Week." New American, March 31, 1913, p. 6, as Bridge in Winter.
New York Times 1913–I
"At the W. T. Evans Sale." New York Times, April 2, 1913, p. 11, as Bridge in Winter.
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, p. 436 (catalogue G, no. 92), as Bridge in Winter. (Hale concordance).
Peters 1989–I
Peters, Lisa N. "Twachtman's Greenwich Paintings: Context and Chronology." In John Twachtman: Connecticut Landscapes, by Deborah Chotner, Lisa N. Peters, and Kathleen A. Pyne. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1989. Exhibition catalogue (1989–II National Gallery of Art), p. 37, as Bridge in Winter.
May 1990
May, Stephen. "Twachtman at the Wadsworth Atheneum." Art Times (March 1990), p. 9, as Bridge in Winter.
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, pp. 424-25, 468-69; vol. 2, p. 970 ill. in b/w (fig. 470), as Bridge in Winter.
Larkin 1996
Larkin, Susan G. "'A Regular Rendezvous for Impressionists:' The Cos Cob Art Colony 1882–1920." Ph.D. dissertation, 1996. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microforms, 1996, pp. xviii, 133–34, 367 ill. in b/w (4.24), as Bridge in Winter.
Peters 1999–I
Peters, Lisa N. John Henry Twachtman: An American Impressionist. Atlanta: High Museum of Art, 1999. Exhibition catalogue (1999 High Museum of Art), pp. 150, 154 ill. in color, as Bridge in Winter.
Glueck 2001
Glueck, Grace. "A Connecticut Colony That Radiated Sunshine." New York Times, March 9, 2001, p. E38, as Bridge in Winter.
Larkin 2001–I
Larkin, Susan G. The Cos Cob Art Colony: Impressionists on the Connecticut Shore. New York: National Academy of Design in association with Yale University, 2001. Exhibition catalogue (2001 National Academy of Design), pp. 40 ill. in color, 41, 81, as Bridge in Winter.
Commentary

Bridge in Winter is among Twachtman's images rendered from the Holley House in Cos Cob, looking north across the mill pond and the bridge over it that doubled as a dam. The red horizontal in the right distance is the Palmer and Duff Shipyard, which was no longer in operation by the time of this painting (fig. 1). To its left is the shipyard's store (see fig. 1 in Lilacs in Winter, OP.1515). Lilac bushes in the foreground establish a detached perspective for the viewer, from which the distance seems only gradually to become visible through the atmospheric mist. 

The painting was included in Twachtman’s estate sale in 1903, from which it was purchased by William T. Evans. It was acquired from the sale in 1913 of works from Evans’s collection by Knoedler Gallery for $1,450. The gallery sold it in the same year to the New Haven, Connecticut, lawyer Burton Mansfield (1856–1933) for $1,700.[1]  By 1917, the painting was in the collection of Beulah Hepburn Emmet of Rye, New York, who kept the painting until 1986.

[1]  Knoedler Book 6, stock no. 13159, p. 60, row 49, Knoedler Archives, Getty Research Institute.

Selected Literature

From New American 1913

“The Bridge in Winter,” one of those spiritualized interpretations of a scene that to ordinary eye might have seemed quite commonplace, but which, when the significance of the facts have been enhanced by this artist’s exquisite imagination, affect one with an extraordinary poignancy of spiritual delight.

From Larkin 2001–I

In its understated color and refined facture, Twachtman’s Bridge in Winter evokes Chinese scroll paintings, while the shrubbery with calligraphic stems through which one views the distant landscape recalls similar screening devices in Japanese prints [p. 41].
          . . . . Twachtman, [Ernest] Lawson’s teacher, also depicted the shipyard, in two winter landscapes (figs. 24 and 46). Unlike Lawson, Twachtman minimized detail and generalized form, reducing the buildings to two-dimensional shapes on a flat canvas. For Bridge in Winter (see fig. 24), he used a nearly monochromatic palette and screened the view of the shipyard with a clump of shrubbery. Those devices, coupled with the near abstraction of both paintings, create a sense of distance between viewer and subject—not the illusory physical distance produced by strict adherence to rules of perspective, but a temporal remoteness. Veiled by snow, the ghostly shipyard seems to inhabit a time removed from that of painter and viewer [p. 81].