Order Moran book set - Domestic and Wild: Peter Moran's Images of America
Spanierman Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of works on paper by Peter Moran (1841–1914), to be held January 19–February 18, 2012. Part of the noted Moran family of artists, Peter Moran was a painter and etcher, specializing in rural scenes and pastoral landscapes. This exhibition presents drawings in graphite and gouache, including views of East Hampton, New York, and probably other sites on Long Island.
Born in Bolton, Lancashire, England, on March 4, 1841, Peter Moran was one of ten children born to Thomas Moran, Sr., a weaver, and his wife, Mary (Higson) Moran. His four brothers became painters, including his older brothers, Thomas (who acquired fame as a painter of the American West) and Edward (who became a well-known marine artist), and his younger brothers, Percy and Léon.
After moving to the United States in 1844, the family settled in Kensington, on the outskirts of Philadelphia. Peter Moran began his professional life as a lithographer, but turned to painting in 1859, studying in Philadelphia under his brothers Thomas and Edward. He was drawn from the outset of his career to the rural subjects of the French Barbizon painters Emile Charles Lambinet and Constant Troyen, as well as to the cattle pictures of Rosa Bonheur. In late 1863, he traveled to England, where he studied the work of the celebrated animalier, Edwin Henry Landseer. On his return to America in the following year, he “set himself to the delineation of Pennsylvania farm-life—particularly of barn-interiors and domestic animals,” as was reported by George Sheldon in the Art Journal in 1878. Establishing his studio in Philadelphia, Peter Moran took over his brother Thomas’s place as an instructor at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, and on July 7, 1867, he married his student, Emily Kelley. In the period that followed, he gained renown for his paintings (including receiving an award at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition) as well as for his etchings. He made four trips to the American West, in 1879, 1880, 1881, and 1890, resulting in his highly regarded images of pueblo life, the “Snake Dance” of the Hopi, and other scenes of the landscape and people he encountered in travels in New Mexico and through the Nevada, Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming territories.
Field sketching was a constant practice for Peter Moran. He took both short and extended trips for this purpose, at times accompanied by Emily. Among his sites were League Island, located directly south of Philadelphia at the confluence of the Schuylkill and Delaware Rivers; the woodlands along the Schuylkill; the countryside twenty miles north of Philadelphia, near Doylestown, Pennsylvania, in Bucks County, where he often spent summers rendering Neshaminy Creek and its tributaries; Cape May and Atlantic City, New Jersey; and East Hampton, Long Island, where he visited his brother and attended festive family events.
Peter Moran may have first have encountered East Hampton, when he joined Thomas there in mid-July of 1879, shortly before the two headed West together. Thomas had only discovered East Hampton in the previous summer, but in the spring of 1884, East Hampton became the permanent home for Thomas and his family. Thomas often created sketches of his surroundings, and Peter may well have accompanied him in roaming the rural countryside to capture the area’s fresh, sparkling atmosphere, the still reflections in calm ponds, and the patterned effects of verdant fields edged by scrims of vegetation, arrayed by wildflowers, and rhythmically accented by willows and oak trees. Many of Thomas Moran’s images of Georgica, Goose, Fresh, and Hook Ponds as well as Egypt Road and other locations on the East End are close in their topography to the drawings by Peter included in this exhibition.
Rendered in graphite with the frequent addition of Chinese white to add light, shade, and atmosphere, Peter Moran’s field sketches combine direct observation with thoughtfully resolved compositions. Using his pencil with the versatility of a paint brush, he captured the essential qualities of form and movement in foliage and trees and the play of reflections and shadows across water and hills. He framed his arrangements with trees and bushes, organizing his designs to guide the viewer’s eye on a gradual progression into the distance without abrupt or jarring transitions. His works evoke the pastoral ideal, revealing the capacity of nature to sooth and restore. While reflective of Moran’s admiration for the Barbizon School, they also demonstrate the artist’s distinctive light but precise touch. That Peter Moran considered his drawings complete is demonstrated in the presence of his signature on many of the images, which he had the practice of pulling out of his sketchbooks to give to friends.
