Art of the White Mountains at MFA Boston

Image Lancaster, New Hampshire, 1862
Robert S. Duncanson (American, 1821–1872)
Oil on canvas
The John Axelrod Collection—Frank B. Bemis Fund and Charles H. Bayley Fund
Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. All rights reserved.

Art of the White Mountains

MFA Museum of Fine Arts Boston
July 14, 2012 - July 7, 2013 

Beginning in the first decades of the 19th century, artists and writers were drawn to the pristine beauty of northern New Hampshire's natural wonders. The singular topography of the White Mountains inspired early landscapists including Thomas Doughty, Thomas Cole, and Benjamin Champney, later masters Winslow Homer and George Inness, and 20th-century modernists such as William Zorach. This exhibition will examine the allure of the White Mountains for artists for over a century and a half.

 

Image of The Artist In The Country (For Appleton's Journal of Literature, Science, and Art, June 19, 1869, p. 353), 1869
Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910)
Wood engraving
Gift of W. G. Russell Allen
Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Works ranging from sketches of the region’s flora and geological formations to panoramic vistas of the expansive landscape will be featured in a selection of more than 30 oil paintings, drawings, prints, watercolors, sketchbooks, photographs, and rare books. Rarely seen gems by Alvan Fisher, Jasper Cropsey, and Robert S. Duncanson will be joined by more widely known views by George Inness and Sanford Gifford to underscore the importance of the White Mountains in the American landscape tradition.

Image of An October Afternoon, 1871
Sanford Robinson Gifford (American, 1823–1880)
Oil on canvas
Henry H. and Zoe Oliver Sherman Fund
Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Image of Randolph, New Hampshire, 1915
William Zorach (American (born in Lithuania), 1889–1966)
Oil on canvas
Tompkins Collection—Arthur Gordon Tompkins Fund
Courtesy Zabriskie Gallery, New York