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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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Keywords
P.815
Red House, Pelham Lane, Branchville
Alternate titles: The Cottage; The Little Red Shack
ca. 1888–91
Pastel and graphite on paper
9 1/2 x 8 1/4 in. (24.1 x 21 cm)
Cincinnati Art Museum, Gift of Gavin Spanierman (2015.466)
Image: Roz Akin
Provenance
Julian Alden Weir;
to his daughter, G. Page Ely, Old Lyme, Connecticut, as of 1957;
by descent in the family;
(Spanierman, 2002);
to Peter Falk, 2004;
to (Gavin Spanierman, 2010);
gift to present collection, 2015.
Exhibitions
1891 Wunderlich probably
H. Wunderlich & Co, New York, Paintings in Oil and Pastels by J. H. Twachtman, March 1891, no. 16, as The Cottage.
1893 American Art Galleries probably
American Art Galleries, New York, Paintings, Pastels, and Etchings by J. Alden Weir, J. H. Twachtman, Claude Monet, and Paul Albert Besnard, by May 4–mid-November 1893, no. 41, as The Cottage.
2013 Greenwich Historical Society
Greenwich Historical Society, Connecticut, The New Spirit and the Cos Cob Art Colony: Before and After the Armory Show, October 9, 2013–January 12, 2014. (Leeds 2013), as Red House, Pelham Lane, Branchville, lent by Gavin Spanierman Ltd, New York.
Literature
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. 588 (catalogue A, no. 972), as Red House, Pelham Lane, Branchville. (Hale concordance).
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. 266; vol. 2, p. 808 ill. in b/w (fig. 284), as Red House, Pelham Lane, Branchville.
Leeds 2013
Leeds, Valerie Ann. The New Spirit and the Cos Cob Art Colony: Before and After the Armory Show. Greenwich, Conn.: Greenwich Historical Society, 2013. Exhibition catalogue (2013 Greenwich Historical Society), pp. 7 ill. in color, 9, 37, as Red House, Pelham Lane, Branchville.
Commentary

As in J. Alden Weir's Cottage, Branchville, Connecticut (P.814), the subject in this pastel is a red cottage on Pelham Lane, the road that marked the southern edge of Julian Alden Weir's property in Branchville. Twachtman outlined the small building, filling it in with just enough color to reveal the steps leading up to its raised front porch, covered by an awning. Depicting the building through trees, Twachtman expressed its peaceful seclusion in a sun-dappled setting.

The work was probably the pastel included as The Cottage in Twachtman's solo 1891 exhibition at Wunderlich Gallery. A reviewer for the Brooklyn Eagle may have had it in mind in the statement: “This artist does not see solid substances in nature; earth, air, sea, and all that arose on and in them that are constructed of primal cosmos before it solidified.”[1] The Cottage can be assumed to be the work of this title shown as well at the American Art Galleries in 1893. 

[1] Brooklyn Eagle 1891.