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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Catalogue Entry

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Keywords
OP.1437
The Pier, Gloucester
Alternate titles: Gloucester Wharf; The Pier
ca. 1902
Oil on canvas
25 1/4 x 25 in. (64.1 x 63.5 cm)
Stamped lower right: Twachtman Sale [1903 estate sale]
Private collection
Exhibitions
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. 83, as The Pier.
1922 Ferargil Galleries
Ferargil Galleries, New York, group show, June 1922, as Gloucester Wharf.
Literature
Sun 1903–II
"Twachtman Pictures, $16,610." Sun (New York), March 25, 1903, p. 5, as The Pier.
New York Times 1903–III
"Twachtman Picture Sale." New York Times, March 25, 1903, p. 5, as The Pier.
New York Times 1922
"The World of Art: The Galleries in June." New York Times Book Review and Magazine, June 11, 1922, p. 73 ill. in b/w, as Gloucester Wharf.
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. 480 (catalogue G, no. 461), as The Pier. (Hale concordance).
Shannon's 2002
Fine American and European Paintings. Auction catalogue, October 24, 2002. Milford, Conn.: Shannon's Fine Art Auctioneers, 2002, lot 65 ill. in color, as The Pier, Gloucester.
Commentary

This Gloucester painting was included in Twachtman’s 1903 estate sale with the title of The Pier. It was purchased from the sale for $200 by the artist William Louis Carrigan (1868–1939).

It seems clear this painting was rendered during the summer of 1902 because its subject is the pier overlooking Wonson's Cove that Twachtman featured in many of his works from that summer. The pier was a short distance from his cottage at the Harbor View Hotel (see Harbor View Hotel, OP.1445). The site featured here seems to be the same as in Boat Landing (OP.1438), but depicted from a more distant vantage point. In fact, the two works could even have been created on the same day. Rendered in similar warm-toned palettes, both feature the view looking across Wonson's Cove to the Outer Harbor and include a single sloop anchored at the pier at a tall mooring post with what seems to be a looped end to its right. In both paintings, Twachtman used individual strokes of paint to indicate the presence of architectural structures in the distance. In this larger composition, he balanced the composition through the bright orange bollard on the wharf at the right, which is at a pivotal point in the cross-axial design.