Provenance

E. & A. Milch, Inc.

Milch Galleries

Active 1912 - 1981

Explore selected works

We look beyond a cluster of flags hanging from the side of one tall building onto a wide street at a row of buildings across from us in this vertical painting. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes, so some details are difficult to make out. We seem to lean out a window to look along the street, so the building to our right only skims the edge of the composition and continues off the top. The three flags closest to us fly from nearly horizontal flagstaffs along the bottom edge of the painting. All the flags are in shades of scarlet red, white, and royal blue. The flag closest to us is red with the red, white, and blue Union Jack in the upper corner. Beyond it is an American flag with 49 stars, and then the French flag with the vertical bands of blue, white, and red. Those three flags are repeated about a dozen times along the building that stretches away from us, along the right edge of the painting. More of those flags are hung from the cream-white and tan buildings across the street, to our left. Some of those buildings reach off the top edge of the canvas and others come close. The shadows along moldings and the windows are painted with pale and lapis blue. Through narrow gaps left between the fluttering flags, vertical strokes of navy blue and violet purple suggest crowds of people in the street below. The sky between the buildings is ice blue. The artist signed and dated the painting in the center left, “Childe Hassam May 17 1917.”
Childe Hassam, Allies Day, May 1917, 1917, oil on canvas, Gift of Ethelyn McKinney in memory of her brother, Glenn Ford McKinney, 1943.9.1

Allies Day, May 1917

Childe Hassam · 1917 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1943.9.1

Two men with pale skin, wearing white sleeveless shirts and royal-blue caps, row in unison in a long, narrow boat on a placid blue river in this horizontal landscape painting. The low, honey-colored wooden boat extends off both sides of the canvas. Both men face our left as they row to our right. The man in front looks ahead of him, beyond the stern of the boat, and the man to our right, closer to the bow, tucks his chin down to look past his shoulder. Their bare, muscled arms are extended straight as the two oars sweep back. The tip of another boat runs close and parallel to the bottom edge of the composition, spanning the left three-quarters of the painting. The opposite riverbank is lined with a dense forest of pine-green trees. People crowd along the decks of a steamboat and a paddleboat near the riverbank to our left. Another narrow skuller, rowed by four people wearing ruby-red shirts, cuts through the water at the back center of the river. The riverbank beyond is lined with people, painted with strokes of black and white, and minuscule touches of red. The horizon comes halfway up the composition. Cream-white clouds float across a muted, topaz-blue sky above the trees.
Thomas Eakins, The Biglin Brothers Racing, 1872, oil on canvas, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, 1953.7.1

The Biglin Brothers Racing

Thomas Eakins · 1872 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1953.7.1

Shown from the knees up, and older, clean-shaven, pale-skinned man rests one elbow on a broken column in this vertical portrait painting. He rests on his right elbow, on our left, so his body creates a diagonal from the lower right to the top center of the composition. He looks at us with clear blue eyes under low brows. His fleshy cheeks are lightly flushed. Wrinkles line his mouth, which is closed in a slight smile. He has jowls and a double chin, and his face is marked with few flesh-colored bumps near his mouth and under one eye. Thick, white hair is brushed back from his forehead, and shoulder-length curls frame his wide face. His is lit from our left so the far side of his face is largely in shadow except for that eye. A strip of bright white fabric encircles his neck above the collar of his long, steel-gray coat. Only the bottom half of the buttons down the front are fastened. White ruffles line his wrists. A glimpse of a golden yellow garment and dark trousers are visible where the coat splits near the bottom of the painting. His left hand, to our right, is thrust into that coat pocket. The other elbow rests on the light brown stone column base on a tall pedestal, and he touches his midsection with those fingers. The left half of the background is dark brown and the right half opens onto a green tree silhouetted against a hazy-pink and aquamarine-blue sky.
John Singleton Copley, Epes Sargent, c. 1760, oil on canvas, Gift of the Avalon Foundation, 1959.4.1

Epes Sargent

John Singleton Copley · c. 1760 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1959.4.1

Shown from the knees up, a pale-skinned woman stands close to us with a red schoolhouse in the distance under a sunset sky in this vertical painting. The woman’s body faces us, but she turns her head to look off to the left with light brown eyes. She has a short, straight nose, full pink lips, and a round face. Her blond hair is pulled up under a round white hat layered with ruffles, which lies like a pancake over the top of her head. Her white dress is vertically striped with thin rust-red lines and has a long-sleeved, tight-fitting bodice and a long skirt. A dark gray belt is cinched around her narrow waist, and she wears a black, lacy ruffle around her neck. The woman’s arms hang by her sides, and she holds two paperback-sized books in her left hand, to our right. An earth-brown lawn stretches back to the schoolhouse, which has crimson-red walls, a chimney, and a dark gray roof. Three forms painted with a few streaks of dark or light gray or topaz blue suggest people standing near the door of the schoolhouse. Trees and a grassy lawn beyond the building are loosely painted with blended strokes. The sky is shaded pale lemon yellow and light peach with touches of rose pink. The artist signed and dated the lower right corner, “HOMER 1873.”
Winslow Homer, The Red School House, 1873, oil on canvas, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1985.64.21

The Red School House

Winslow Homer · 1873 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1985.64.21

A woman sits facing our right in profile, looking through downcast eyes at a lute she holds upright in her lap in this vertical painting. She has smooth, pale skin, and her tawny-brown hair is pulled gathered at the back of her neck. She holds her head high, so she looks down through lowered eyes toward her lap. Her full, pale-pink lips are slightly parted. Her long gown swirls with tones of pine, moss, and sage green with a few strokes of earth brown. Her garment, especially around the neckline, is loosely painted so it is difficult to tell if her decolletage is bare or is covered by a sheer fabric. The sleeve we see is slashed along the elbow so fabric in lighter green shows through. Her dress drapes over her feet, which are cropped by the bottom right corner of the composition. The woman is brightly lit from the upper center, but the bench on which she sits blends into the nearly black background. She braces the neck of the lute where it meets the body with long, delicate fingers, so the instrument stands in her lap with the flat soundboard facing her. The neck tips slightly away from her body, and she rests her right hand, closer to us, on the soundboard with her fingers crooked. The lute is a mahogany brown and has radiating lines that extend from the side closest to us up along the back of the body. The pegboard at the top of the neck is barely cropped by the right edge of the composition. The lute is finely detailed, which contrasts with the loose brushwork of the woman’s dress. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner, “TW Dewing 86.”
Thomas Wilmer Dewing, Lady with a Lute, 1886, oil on wood, Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Walter Timme, 1978.60.1

Lady with a Lute

Thomas Wilmer Dewing · 1886 · oil on wood ·  Accession ID  1978.60.1

A young, gangly, brown-skinned boy sits on a green chair and leans over the banjo he plays in this loosely painted, vertical composition. His body faces our right in profile, and his head leans to his left and away from us. Light comes from our left to highlight his ear and the side of his chin, but throws his profile into shadow against the lighter background. The boy has short black hair and wears a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, black pants, and black shoes. The floor is loosely painted with streaks of earth brown, taupe, and dark moss green. The wall behind the boy is painted with visible strokes of parchment brown, peachy tan, pearl white, and fog gray. The space to our left of the boy is dark brown, and an outline of a standing person is sketched in the top left corner. A grid is overlaid across the boy’s body and the chair.
Thomas Eakins, Study for "The Dancing Lesson": The Banjo Player, probably 1877, oil on canvas on cardboard, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1985.64.16

Study for "The Dancing Lesson": The Banjo Player

Thomas Eakins · probably 1877 · oil on canvas on cardboard ·  Accession ID  1985.64.16

This painting depicts a sunlit forest with densely packed trees. Sunlight filters through the leaves, casting a warm glow and illuminating shades of green with hints of yellow and gold. The forest floor is covered in dark green vegetation and gray rocks, with small visible people in the distance. One of the people is wearing a red shirt or jacket. In the background, the trees become less defined and merge into a misty blur of light and dark greens. The paint has been applied with thick, visible brushstrokes.
Henry Ward Ranger, Spring Woods, c. 1910, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.202

Spring Woods

Henry Ward Ranger · c. 1910 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.202