Full Text:

(feature on "William Merritt Post and The Country Stream" @Mattatuck Msm)

Reinhold Collection A "Permanent Resource" For Mattatuck Museum--

William Merritt Post: A Connecticut Artist Is Rediscovered

(with cuts & SIDEBAR)

BY SHANNON HICKS

WATERBURY -- After the Civil War, American painters became less enchanted with

capturing the vastness of the countryside and instead turned to the landscape

as a way of depicting personal retreat. One of Connecticut's most prolific

landscape artists -- who is also considered by many art historians to have

been one the state's most significant -- was William Merritt Post, who spent

summers in and then moved to Connecticut in the early 1900s.

Through February 20, The Mattatuck Museum is presenting an exhibition of the

work of William Merritt Post. Thirty landscapes, many fairly large in scale,

have been hung to create "William Merritt Post and The Art of The Country

Stream." While many pieces have been loaned from collectors and museums such

as The Heckscher Museum in Long Island, the exhibition really was made

possible because of a generous grant from Connecticut resident Ann Tolman,

whose parents were collectors of Post's work.

Ms Tolman's parents were neighbors of William Post and his family when the

artist died in 1935. Two years following the artist's death, an auction was

held at the artist's estate. It was at this time Frank and Martha Reinhold,

Ann Reinhold Tolman's parents, bought most of the contents of Post's studio.

Among their acquisitions were dozens of landscapes, over a dozen of the

artist's annotated sketchbooks, hundreds of preparatory sketches and small

oils, and his paints, brushes and other painting equipment.

After maintaining her parents' home in Watertown for a number of years, Ann

Tolman, along with her husband, gave the extensive collection to the Mattatuck

in October 1996. While the works had been in storage almost since the time her

parents had purchased the artist's studio, "storage" for the most part meant

stacked up and put away in an attic. Many of the pieces needed to be repaired

in one form or another, either matted and reframed or cleaned. A February 1

program at the museum will include looking at some of the pieces in the

collection being seen in their "Before" and "After" status.

"This has been a project I have very much enjoyed," Ann Smith, a curator at

The Mattatuck, said during a recent walk-through of the exhibition. "It's been

a lot of work, to make the collection ready to be seen."

It is fitting the works from the Reinhold collection are being shared with the

public through the efforts of the Mattatuck. The only art museum in

northwestern Connecticut, the Mattatuck is also the only museum in the state

fully focused on artists connected to Connecticut. The Reinhold collection is

comprised of over 300 paintings; 60 are currently on view.

"William Merritt Post and The Art of the Country Stream" is the first

comprehensive review of Post's accomplishments. Guest curator Professor J.

Leonard Benson has brought together works from across the country, including

the Reinhold's significant group of sketches and studio studies, unseen by

anyone for more than 60 years.

Professor Benson also wrote an essay for the exhibition's catalogue, and

provided an extensively detailed log of Post's works and financial records of

what many of the artist's paintings originally sold for. The log also includes

a number of earlier essays written by the professor.

"This is a very exciting show for us," said Ms Smith. "We consider this gift a

permanent resource for the museum. It gives us a chance to study and

appreciate Post's work even more.

"This truly gives us a real sense of the artist."

A Prolific Painter

Born into a New England seafaring family, few details of Post's early life are

easily found. He was born in 1856, and had three siblings. His parents

separated after 16 years of marriage, but the family was always provided for.

In fact, William Post was apparently able to live into his twenties before he

had to find a career.

Post kept detailed diaries during his life, which historians have scoured.

There are no references to any particular vocation until 1879, when, after an

excursion to a marshy region outside Brooklyn, Post wrote: "I know if I was an

artist that this region would be one of the first places I should strike for."

It was not until Post was 24, in fact, that a diary entry mentions drawing

lessons he was taking with Samuel Frost Johnson.

While sketches from a life class at the Art Students' League during the

academic year 1881-82 show Post could have had a strong career as a sketch

artist, Post seems to have committed himself from the beginning to a career in

landscape painting.

Post became a painter during the first generation that was able to make a

living from their art -- just before the turn of the century. New York City

was, at that time, the center of American art activity, with art schools, art

critics, art publications, commercial galleries, artists' associations,

museums and collectors. At this point, it is believed there were more than

1,000 artists living in New York City.

By the early 1890s, when the artist was in his late 30s or early 40s, his

career was coming into view. Post's style, explained Ms Smith, was becoming

more recognized by others. He seems to have begun focusing on what he would

eventually become best known for: the river landscapes that make up much of

his professional portfolio. His autumnal harvest scenes, said the museum's

curator, are considered Post's most popular and appealing pieces of work.

Landscapes, continued Ms Smith, were very popular at the end of the 19th

Century.

"The idea you could retreat to the country was very, very appealing," Ms Smith

said. "People were ready to buy these pictures." In order to produce such

works on-site, while maintaining residence in New York City, artists began

summering in Connecticut, producing massive numbers of works during the summer

months.

Post and his family began spending summers in Bethlehem, Conn., in 1908. Four

years later the family moved to West Morris (now Bantam). This is one point

where Post stood apart from his fellow artists: while most summering landscape

painters had been attracted to the shoreline colonies of Cos Cob, Old Lyme and

Mystic, Post instead chose to make his new home in the state's opposite

location, the northwest hills of Litchfield County.

In addition, while most painters were taking the impressionist approach to

landscape painting, Post chose to concentrate and explore the country using a

realist approach.

This theme is unmistakably prevalent in the Mattatuck exhibition. Many of his

landscapes are believed to be scenes of the Bantam River, which ran through

his backyard.

Ms Smith visited the Bantam River area recently. She was amazed at what she

saw, compared to what Post painted on his canvases.

"It looks just like this! I believe he was pedaling around Litchfield County,

capturing the river and its tributaries," she said.

Another distinction that can be seen in Post's work is his choice of colors

used. While his peers chose the brighter palette of Impressionism, William

Merritt Post went with the more sober hues of Tonalism. It would not be until

his much later work, when he began depicting sunsets, that Post would select

stronger colors for his paintings.

Post was elected an associate member of the National Academy of Design, an

honor awarded to fewer than 100 painters during the 30 years of his active

painting. He was not, however, among the 140 who were elected to full

membership in the National Academy during the same period. Some scholars

believe this slight may have been the result of Post's withdrawal from the New

York scene during the years spent in Connecticut.

Post's work was regularly accepted for exhibition at the National Academy's

shows and until early in this century, at the more "modern" Society of

American Artists exhibitions. He frequently had his works exhibited in art

centers throughout the eastern United States.

Additionally, his reputation as a watercolor painter was enhanced by an

article on watercolor techniques he published in a leading art journal,

Palette and Bench , and also by his election to membership into the American

Watercolor Society.

At his prime, Post was exhibiting 15 to 20 times a year. He painted right up

to his death at the age of 79, though not as prolifically. The reasons for

Post's decline in productivity was two-fold.

For one thing, the art world was changing. In New York, still the headquarters

for so many artists, the art world was beginning to pay more attention to

Picasso and the abstract works of his contemporaries. Post's realist works

would be considered old-fashioned when compared to the brighter works of the

new artists.

Secondly, Post was growing older. "He deserved a rest at this point," said Ms

Smith.

By the final decade of his life, there was a shift from the focus on the

Bantam River to the area's surrounding trees. Each stage of the artist's shift

in attention is clearly seen in the Mattatuck exhibition.

"William Merritt Post and The Art of The Country Stream" is accompanied by a

32-page catalogue. Professor J. Leonard Brown, for many years a member of the

faculty in the art history department at the University of Massachusetts,

wrote the catalogue's essay, which concerns Post's life and work. The

catalogue also contains 36 illustrations, many of which are in color.