Tourn Mountain, Head Quarters of Washington, Rockland Co., New York

1851

Jasper Francis Cropsey

Painter, American, 1823 - 1900

A river winds from close to us to a distant mountain outlined against a dim sky in this horizontal landscape painting, which has a shallowly arched top. The rippling river bends from the bottom right corner of the canvas into the middle of the painting and then curves out of view in a grassy field. Wisps of fog to the right show the distant path of the river. Land in the lower left corner of the painting is loosely painted with earthy green and brown, which could represent grass, rocks, and fallen tree trunks. Sunlight warms a single-story, compact, white-walled house with a brown roof and a chimney in a clearing to the left. A few trees stand near the house, and a tree-carpeted mountain rises sharply beyond it. The mountain is backlit or thrown into shadow by the low sun. In the top quarter of the composition, pale peach-colored clouds kick up around the mountain against a pink-tinged horizon in the blue sky. The artist signed and dated the painting as if he had written on a rock in the lower center of the composition, “1851 J.F. Cropsey.”

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Artwork overview

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Purchased by 1857 from the artist by William Wilson Corcoran [1798-1888], Washington;[1] gift 1869 to the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington; acquired 2015 by the National Gallery of Art.
[1] The artist lent the painting to an 1853 exhibition at the Massachusetts Academy of Fine Arts. He kept a list of sales in his Account Book, 1843-68, but there is no record of a sale to Corcoran (Newington-Cropsey Foundation, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, microfilmed in the Jasper Francis Cropsey Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington: reel 336, no frame number), in whose 1857 collection catalogue the painting is listed as Washington's Headquarters on the Hudson River.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1853

  • First Semi-Annual Exhibition, Massachusetts Academy of Fine Arts, Boston, 24 January - 1 May 1953, no. 16.

1916

  • Extended loan, The Louise Home, Washington, 6 January 1916 - 3 May 1923, no catalogue.

1952

  • Tribute to William Wilson Corcoran, George Washington Univesity Library, Washington, 1952, no catalogue.

1955

  • Hudson River School, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, 1955, no catalogue.

1966

  • Past and Present: 250 Years of American Art, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, 1966, no catalogue.

1974

  • Light and Shadow, South Texas Artmobile, Sixth Exhibit, Corpus Christi, September 1974 - May 1975.

1975

  • Loan for display at The White House, Washington, 1976.

  • 19th Century American Landscape Paintings, Great Hall, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 15 October - 10 December 1975, no catalogue.

2005

  • Encouraging American Genius: Master Paintings from the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY; Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte; John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, 2005-2007, checklist no. 22.

2008

  • The American Evolution: A History through Art, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, 2008, unpublished checklist.

2013

  • American Journeys: Visions of Place, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, 21 September 2013 - 28 September 2014, unpublished checklist.

Bibliography

1857

  • Lanman, Charles. Catalogue of W.W. Corcoran's Gallery. Washington, 1857: 14, no. 54, as Washington's Headquarters on the Hudson River.

1966

  • Phillips, Dorothy W. A Catalogue of the Collection of American Paintings in The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Vol. 1: Painters born before 1850. Washington, 1966: 109-110, repro., as Washington's Headquarters on the Hudson.

2000

  • Cash, Sarah, with Terrie Sultan. American Treasures of the Corcoran Gallery of Art. New York, 2000: 65, repro., as Washington's Headquarters on the Hudson.

2011

  • Wagner, Ann Prentice. "Jasper Francis Cropsey, Tourn Mountain, Head Quarters of Washington, Rockland Co., New York. In Corcoran Gallery of Art: American Paintings to 1945. Edited by Sarah Cash. Washington, 2011: 102-103, 121, 261-262, repro.

2013

  • Speiser, Anthony M., ed. _Jasper Francis Cropsey: Catalogue Raisonne, Works in Oil; Works in Oil, Volume One: 1842-1863 _. Hastings-on-Hudson, 2013: 133-135, repro.

Inscriptions

lower center on rock: 1851 / J.F. Cropsey

Wikidata ID

Q46628186

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