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Looking Over the Hudson at Milton

Alternate TitleOverlooking the Hudson at Milton
Artist George Inness (American, 1825 - 1894)
Dateca. 1886-1888
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsUnframed: 27 1/16 x 22 inches (68.74 x 55.88 cm)
Framed: 40 1/8 x 35 1/8 x 4 1/2 inches (101.93 x 89.23 x 11.43 cm)
Credit LinePurchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust
Object number33-87
SignedSigned and dated lower right: G. Inness / 1888.
On View
On view
Gallery Location
  • 216
Collections
DescriptionLand- and seascape; view from hill (foreground) to river below (background); trees at right, girl in bonnet seated on hillside in the midst of various plant forms, rustic flower pot on tripod stand in right foreground; river boats and distant hills in background.Exhibition History

Exhibition of the Paintings Left by the Late G. Inness, American Fine Arts Society, New York, December 27, 1894–February 1, 1895, no. 229.

 

Paintings by the Late George Inness, N.A., Fifth Avenue Art Galleries, New York, February 2–14, 1895, no. 226.

 

Retrospective and Comparative Exhibition of Paintings by the Late George Inness, N.A. and a Few Examples of the Late A. H. Wyant from the George H. A[i]nslie Collection, Detroit Museum of Art, November 1–30, 1913, no. 22 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).

 

Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, N.A., Alexander H. Wyant, N.A., Aston Knight, Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, N.Y.,  January 6–26, 1914, no. 17 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).

 

An Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, N.A., and Alexander H. Wyant, N.A., City Art Museum of St. Louis, February 1914, no. 18 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).

 

Paintings by the Late George Inness, N.A. from the Geo. H. Ainslie Collection, Museum of History, Science and Art, Los Angeles, March 13–31, 1915, no. 12 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).

 

[“Exhibition of American Paintings”], M. Knoedler Gallery, New York, July–August 1919, no cat.

 

Special Exhibition of American Landscape Paintings, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Mo., June 1939, no cat.

 

A Retrospective Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, Paine Art Center, Oshkosh, Wisc., 2–28 October 1962, no. 22 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

Four Centuries of American Art, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, November 27, 1963–January 19, 1964, unnumbered (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

19th Century American Topographic Painters, Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Fla., November 21, 1974–January 5, 1975, no. 71 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

19th-Century American Arts and Crafts, Charles H. MacNider Museum, Mason City, Iowa, August 17–September 14, 1975, no cat. (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

George Inness Landscapes: His Signature Years, 1884–1894, Oakland Art Museum, Calif., November 28, 1978–April 15, 1979 (traveled), unnumbered (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

Post-Impressionism: Cross-Currents in European and American Painting, 1880–1906, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., May 25–September 1, 1980, no. 250 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

 

Charmed Places: Hudson River Artists and Their Houses, Studios, and Vistas, Edith C. Blum Art Institute, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y., April 17, 1988–June 11, 1989 (traveled), no. 60 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).

Gallery Label
George Inness painted Looking Over the Hudson at Milton from memory in Montclair, New Jersey, five years after he had stopped spending his summers in Milton, New York. It shows the grand view beyond the back garden at the country home of a good friend of the artist. The steamboat in the middle ground and the ferry on the far bank of the river are reminders that, by the 1880s, Milton, like many other Hudson River towns, increasingly was being used as a vacation spot. 

Although Looking Over the Hudson at Milton was not painted directly from nature, its rich color, flickering light and vibrant brushwork recall French Impressionism, which was increasingly available to audiences in the United States in the late 1880s. 
 
Provenance

To estate of the artist, New Jersey, 1894;

 

to (Fifth Avenue Art Galleries, New York, 12–14 February 1895);

 

to Artemisia Stace Lascell, Charlotte, N.Y., February 1895;

 

(George Ainslie, New York, by November 1913);

 

(M. Knoedler & Co., New York, by July 1919);

 

(Findlay Galleries, New York, by 1933);

 

to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1933.

Published References
American Fine Arts Society, Exhibition of the Paintings Left by the Late G. Inness, exh. cat. (New York: Republic Press, 1894), 48.


“End of the Inness Sale,” New York Times, February 15, 1895, 4 (as Looking Over the Hudson).


“The George Inness Sale,” Collector 6 (February 15, 1895), 131.


“Sale of Inness’ Works Ended,” New York Herald, February 15, 1895, 9.


Fifth Avenue Art Galleries, New York, February 12–14, 1895, lot 226.


Alfred Trumble, George Inness, N.A.: A Memorial of the Student, the Artist and the Man (New York: Collector, 1895), 50.


Retrospective and Comparative Exhibition of Paintings by the Late George Inness, N.A. and a Few Examples of the Late A.H. Wyant from the George H. A[i]nslie Collection, exh. cat. (Detroit: Detroit Museum of Art, 1913), 15 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).


Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, N.A., Alexander H. Wyant, N.A., Aston Knight, exh. cat. (Rochester, N.Y.: Memorial Art Gallery, 1914), 5 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).


An Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, N.A., and Alexander H. Wyant, N.A., exh. cat. (St. Louis: City Art Museum of St. Louis, 1914), 11 (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).


Paintings by the Late George Inness, N.A. from the Geo. H. Ainslie Collection, exh. cat. (Los Angeles: Museum of
History, Science and Art, 1915), unpaginated (as Looking Over the Hudson, Milton).


“Summer Exhibition of American Paintings,” New York Times, 20 July 1919, 71.


“The Acquisitions,” Art Digest 8 (1 December 1933), 21 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


“The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art: Complete Catalogue of Paintings and Drawings,” Art News 32 (9 December 1933), 28 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 126, 137 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


“Art,” Kansas City Star, 30 August 1936, 10A (as View of the Hudson at Milton).


News Flashes (William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts) 2 (1 September 1936), 2 (as View of the Hudson at Milton).


H[enry] C. H[askell], “Art and Artists,” Kansas City Star, June 9, 1939, 17 (as Steamboat on the Hudson).


Winifred Shields, “Traditional New England Scenes Attract Artists Year after Year,” Kansas City Star, August 15, 1952, 20 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 256 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


James Thomas Flexner, That Wilder Image (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1962), 323 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


A Retrospective Exhibition of Paintings by George Inness, exh. cat. (Oshkosh, Wisc.: Paine Art Center, 1962), unpaginated (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Four Centuries of American Art, exh. cat. (Minneapolis: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 1963), unpaginated (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


LeRoy Ireland, The Works of George Inness: An Illustrated Catalogue Raisonné (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1965), 320, no. 1274 (as Looking Over the Hudson, at Milton).


Alfred Werner, Inness Landscapes (New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 1973), 76–77 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 1, Art of the Occident, 5th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 252 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


19th Century American Topographic Painters, exh. cat. (Coral Gables, Fla.: Lowe Art Museum, 1974), 7, 15, 63 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Nicolai Cikovsky Jr., The Life and Work of George Inness (New York: Garland Publishing, 1977), ix, fig. 93 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Marjorie Dakin Arkelian, George Inness Landscapes: His Signature Years, 1884–1894, exh. cat. (Oakland, Calif.: Oakland Art Museum, 1978), 57 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Post-Impressionism: Cross-Currents in European and American Painting, 1880–1906, exh. cat. (Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1980), 223 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Ross E. Taggart, “American Paintings in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri,” Antiques 122 (November 1982), 1039 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Bonnie Langston, “Hudson River School in Session at Bard,” Kingston (N.Y.) Daily Freeman, 29 May 1988, 36 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Harold Faber, “The Legacy of the Hudson River School,” New York Times, 10 June 1988, C1.


“Utopian Landscapes, the Hudson River Valley and Its Artists,” Country Inns, Bed and Breakfast 2 (June–July 1988), 32–33 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Charmed Places: Hudson River Artists and Their Houses, Studios, and Vistas, exh. cat. (New York: Edith C. Blum Art Institute, Bard College, and Vassar College Art Gallery, in association with Harry N. Abrams, 1988), 75, 127 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Ellen R. Goheen, The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams, in association with Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1988), 115, 122–23 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Henry Adams, Handbook of American Paintings in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Kansas City, Mo.: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1991), 97–98 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Roger Ward and Patricia J. Fidler, eds. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collections. 6th ed. (New York: Hudson Hills Press, in association with Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1993), 238 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


May Brawley Hill, Furnishing the Old Fashioned Garden: Three Centuries of American Summerhouses, Dovecotes, Pergolas, Privies, Fences and Birdhouses (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1998), 87 (as Overlooking the Hudson at Milton).


Margaret C. Conrads, ed. The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: American Paintings to 1945 (Kansas City, Mo.: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2007), 1: 16, 346-349 (repro.); 2:142-144 (repro.).


Michael Quick, George Inness: A Catalogue Raisonné, vol. 2 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2007), 227 (repro.).

Information about a particular artwork or image, including provenance information, is based upon historic information and may not be currently accurate or complete. Research on artwork and images is an ongoing process, and the information about a particular artwork or image may not reflect the most current information available to the Museum. If you notice a mistake or have additional information about a particular artwork or image, please e-mail provenance@nelson-atkins.org.


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