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William Merritt Chase

Red Snapper, about 1912

oil on canvas

20 x 24 inches

Gift in Memory of John P. Frenzel, Sr., by His Heirs

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William Merritt Chase was born in Ninevah, Indiana and studied under Barton Hayes in Indianapolis and then briefly at the National Academy of Design.  Due to the interest and generosity of several art patrons, Chase was able to take a five-year trip to Munich, where he studied at the city’s Royal Academy.  In 1878, Chase returned to New York City, opened his Tenth Street Studio and developed his signature impressionist style.  He was a member of America’s influential group of impressionists known as The Ten, but was also an extremely influential teacher.  Chase opened the first summer school of landscape painting at his summer home in Shinnecock, Long Island.  He also taught at the Chase School in New York, which he founded, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.  His students included such famous artists as Marsden Hartley, Charles Demuth, Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe and Charles Sheeler.

In his approach to still-life painting, Chase was inspired by French artist Antoine Vollon (1833-1900), a leader in the revival of the realist still life using common kitchen utensils and food.  In this composition the fish and brass bowl on a table top provided Chase the opportunity to investigate a wide range of contrasting shapes, colors and textures within a simple, harmonious arrangement.  The artist said: “I enjoy painting fishes: in the infinite variety of these creatures, the subtle and exquisitely colored tones of the flesh, fresh from the water, the way their surfaces reflect the light, I take the greatest pleasure…It may be that I will be remembered as a pointer of fish….”

Reference

Ronald G. Pisano.  William Merritt Chase: The Complete Catalogue of Known and Documents Work by William Merritt Chase (1849-1916), Vol. 2: Portraits in Oil, New Haven Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2007.  ISBN-13: 978-0300110210