Arques-la-Bataille

John Henry Twachtman

1885 · Oil on canvas · The American Wing

Celebrated today as one of the most progressive and poetic landscape painters of his day, this work is one of several large canvases Twachtman produced during his two years of study in France. Developed from a plein-air (outdoors) oil sketch, which hangs nearby, it depicts a scene at Arques-la-Bataille, a town four miles southeast of Dieppe, in Normandy, where the Béthune and two other streams flow together to form the Arques River. Its formal design, tonalist palette, and overall aesthetic mood recall Japanese woodblock prints as well as the evocative paintings of James McNeill Whistler—both formative influences on Twachtman.

Artist

John Henry Twachtman

Date

1885

Medium

Oil on canvas

Culture

American

Department

The American Wing

Credit line

Morris K. Jesup Fund, 1968