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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
Montauk Point, ca. 1889 (P.803). Fig. 1. Twachtman, illustration, engraving by Elbridge Kingsley from Lloyd McKim Garrison, "Montauk Point," Scribner's 6 (December 1889), p. 695.
Fig. 1. Twachtman, illustration, engraving by Elbridge Kingsley from Lloyd McKim Garrison, "Montauk Point," Scribner's 6 (December 1889), p. 695.
Keywords
P.803
Montauk Point
ca. 1889
Pastel on paper
13 x 17 in. (33 x 43.2 cm)
Signed lower right: J. H. Twachtman–
Private collection
Provenance
Caroline Coventry Haynes, New York, by 1907;
(James Abbe, East Hampton, New York, by 1961);
Alice Kaplan;
to Alice M. Kaplan Estate, 1995;
by descent to present collection, gift of the Alice M. Kaplan Estate;
Exhibitions
1907–I Lotos Club
Lotos Club, New York, Exhibition of Paintings by the Late John H. Twachtman, January 5–31, 1907, no. 19, as Montauk Point, lent by Caroline C. Haynes.
1913 New York School of Applied Design for Women
New York School of Applied Design for Women, Fifty Paintings by the Late John H. Twachtman, January 15–February 15, 1913, no. 42, as Montauk Point, lent by Miss Caroline C. Haynes.
1969 Guild Hall
Guild Hall, East Hampton, New York, East Hampton: The American Barbizon, 1850–1900, May 10–June 8, 1969, no. 99, as Montauk Point, lent by Mr. and Mrs. Jacob M. Kaplan.
Literature
Garrison 1889
Garrison, Lloyd McKim. "Montauk Point." Scribner's 6 (December 1889), 695, ill. in engraving by Elbridge Kingsley, as Montauk Point.
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. 2, p. 534 (catalogue G, no. 1013), as Montauk Point. (Hale concordance).
Bantel 1981
Bantel, Linda. The Alice M. Kaplan Collection. New York: Advisory Council of the Department of Art History and Archaeology, 1981, pp. 184, 185 ill. in color, as Montauk Point.
Pisano 1985
Pisano, Ronald G. Long Island Landscape Painting, 1820–1920. Boston: Little, Brown, 1985, pp. 132–33 ill. in color, as Montauk Point.
Commentary

Twachtman created this pastel for an illustration published in Scribner’s in 1889. There it accompanied a poem by Lloyd McKim Garrison (an 1888 graduate of Harvard University who later became a lawyer until his unfortunate death at age 33), titled “Montauk Point.” The black-and-white illustration reveals a greater distinction between the dark cliffs and the sea than in this pastel, where the sunlit atmosphere spreads over rocks, water, and sky, seen from an aerial vantage point.

It is possible that this was the pastel Twachtman exhibited in 1892 at the Sixth International Munich Exposition with the title of An der Küste (no. 2340a) (On the Coast).[1] By 1907 the pastel belonged to Caroline Coventry Haynes (1858–1951), a New York artist who studied under William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Alfred Stevens, and Claude Monet. Perhaps Haynes saw a parallel between Monet’s images of the cliffs of Étretat and Twachtman’s abstractly conceived view of the dramatic Montauk coastline.

[1] 1892 Munich Glaspalaste.