Edward Willis Redfield

Alexander Gallery, New York
Private Collection (acquired from the above, 1981)

Tequesta, Florida, Lighthouse Art Center Museum, American Visions: Two Centuries of American Paintings from the Manoogian Collection, 2015 - 2016
Florida, Vero Beach Museum of Art, The American Spirit: Selections form the Manoogian Collection, 2016 - 2017

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes, Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This work is in wonderful condition. The canvas is lined with wax as an adhesive, which is easily reversible if required. The impasto is unaffected by the lining. The paint layer does not seem to be dirty. There are no apparent damages or retouches. The work can certainly be hung in its current state, or the wax lining could be reversed. Regardless, the work is in beautiful condition.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

One of the leading lights of the New Hope School of artists, Edward Redfield is renowned for his vibrant, glistening views of the pastoral landscapes of his native Pennsylvania. He chose to paint en plein air for the most part and his work is characterized by the unsentimental individualism so prevalent in early twentieth century American landscape painting.  In Early Spring, a prime example of the artist’s work at the height of his talent, he portrays the beauty of the changing season with his hallmark thick, bold strokes of pigment and skillful treatment of light and color. A mother and child walking along a country road, placed as a bold diagonal, draw us into the picture plane.  The lush, pastel colors of burgeoning blossoms evoke the essence of early spring in Bucks County, an area Redfield became intimately familiar with over the course of his career, studying and painting it for sixty-five years.

A review of a 1914 exhibition praised Redfield’s vision of his local landscape, stating “Among the men whose work is typical of our time and have done much to instill a distinctive note of nationalism in American Art Edward W. Redfield deserves a most prominent place. An avowed realist his art is concrete and explicit, depicting with extraordinary truthfulness the aspects of nature…In the Delaware valley and the Pennsylvania hill country around Center Bridge, where he lives, every inch of ground is familiar to him. When he has selected a subject for presentation he studies it most analytically and carefully observes under which atmospheric conditions it appears to best advantage, often going a dozen times to the spot before it seems ripe to him. The painting once begun is executed with amazing rapidity; such is the virtuosity that most of his canvasses are completed in a single sitting. Thoroughly conversant with the principle of impressionism as discovered by the Frenchmen, he has evolved a style of his own. He works with a full brush, and vigorously in the most direct manner possible, lays in his subject with pure, vibrating and luminous color. Few artists succeed in creating such a perfect illusion of out of door light and sense of actuality" (Constance Kimmerle, Edward W. Redfield, Just Values and Fine Seeing, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 2004, pp. 119-20).

Lot 24 is illustrated as the cover of this catalogue.