Milton Avery 1885 - 1965

Durand-Ruel, Paris, 1945
Estate of Willavene S. Morris, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by 1962 (sold: Sotheby's, New York, May 30, 1986, lot 242, illustrated)
Peter Findlay Gallery, New York (acquired at the above sale)
Private Collection, United States
20th Century Masters, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above, 1986

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1962 (on loan)

Milton Avery’s landscape paintings of the 1940s were inspired by his annual summer trips, which the artist relished as an opportunity to escape the confines of New York City and immerse himself in nature. Executed in 1944, Beach House depicts a property in Gloucester, Massachusetts that Avery rented for the summer with his wife, Sally, and their daughter, March. The scene illustrates a self-portrait of Avery painting on a porch decorated with two chairs and a vase of flowers—elements present in many of the artist’s still life paintings—set in front of a coastal landscape comprised of bold planes of color. Using the back end of a paintbrush or similar tool, Avery scratched into the paint surface to create texture in the emerald green ocean, ultimately emphasizing the two-dimensionality of the canvas. In Beach House, Avery embraces the aesthetic of artists like Henri Matisse and the Fauves through his use of non-associative color, which, coupled with flattened shapes, brings him closer to abstraction.