Wintry Wonders
6 artworks from 6 artists across 5 galleries
The tour is ordered to begin from the Michigan Avenue entrance. If you are starting in the Modern Wing, simply do your tour in reverse order.
Embrace winter's cooler vibes with this tour exploring the various ways artists have responded to snow, ice, and freezing temps.
-
Winter Scene
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes
Gallery 219, second level, Arts of Europe: Painting and Sculpture Galleries
Two groups of working-class travelers, one with a slaughtered pig in tow, converge on an icy road during a snowstorm. Goya captured the scene’s wintry atmosphere with barren trees, large swaths of cool grays and whites, and diagonal brushstrokes that convey rapid snowfall. This painting is one of a series of studies Goya created for monumental tapestries depicting the four seasons, commissioned for a dining hall at the Royal Palace of El Pardo in Spain."This painting perfectly portrays the conditions of a treacherous winter storm. Huddling closely together, the travelers are doing their best to keep warm. Anyone who's lived in Chicago can relate to their impossible endeavor!"
-
Stack of Wheat (Snow Effect, Overcast Day)
Claude Monet
Gallery 243, second level, Impressionism Galleries
Through 1890 and 1891, Monet created a series of paintings depicting the stacks of wheat that stood outside his farmhouse in Giverny. He painted at several easels simultaneously in the field and then refined pictorial harmonies in the studio. In most of the winter views, like this one, the stacks seem wrapped by bands of hill and field, as if bedded down for the season."One can almost feel the chill in the air in Monet's winter scenes of stacks of wheat. From the sky to the surrounding hills to the snow-covered field, this canvas is dominated by cooler colors."
-
The Coffee House
Alson Skinner Clark
Gallery 179, first level, Arts of the Americas Galleries
In this work, Alson Skinner Clark painted Chicago on a winter day, with ice floating down the river and the city’s skyscrapers looming through smoke and fog. The State Street Bridge, with its characteristic ironwork, draws the viewer’s eye into the picture. Clark’s scene is in the tradition of the urban realism of the French Impressionists. He sought to suggest the ephemeral nature of fog and smoke and the atmosphere’s effect upon the city."Born in Chicago and a student at the School of the Art Institute, Clark knew a thing or two about winter weather, as this chilly scene attests. His early landscapes often featured industrial structures like this bridge over the Chicago River."
-
Mount Equinox, Winter
Rockwell Kent
Gallery 272, second level, Arts of the Americas Galleries
An artist with an adventurous spirit, Rockwell Kent traveled widely, gravitating to snowy locales to find the perfect vistas. For this painting, he set up a shack in remote Vermont as a studio, referring to it as a "handy refuge for a frozen realist.” This wintry view of Mount Equinox is one of a group of Kent's paintings depicting the peak in different seasons."The two deer in this scene seem to suggest the options for outdoor actions during the cold: stand frozen still or bound about energetically to keep warm. What's your cold weather mode?"
-
Love of Winter
George Wesley Bellows
Gallery 272, second level, Arts of the Americas Galleries
“There has been none of my favorite snow," George Bellows wrote to a friend in January 1914. "I must always paint the snow at least once a year.” Soon after, a blizzard hit New York City, inspiring this painting. The bright colors and broad brushstrokes convey the pleasure and movement of the skaters and onlookers who are out enjoying a New York City winter."This energetic group of winter weather enthusiasts comprise a range of ages and social classes, reflecting the diverse populations who enjoyed the public parks and the leisure activities offered in early 20th-century New York City year-round."
-
Icebound
John Henry Twachtman
Gallery 273, second level, Arts of the Americas Galleries
During the last decade of his life, John Henry Twachtman frequently painted views of the landscape surrounding his home in Greenwich, Connecticut. Almost square in format, this painting’s harmonious composition exemplifies Twachtman’s opinion that “never is nature more lovely than when it is snowing.” He enjoyed depicting the beauty of the frozen terrain, believing that it was conducive to contemplation and regeneration."The dense, gradually built-up layers of paint in this work mimic the way snow accumulates on frozen ground. The vividness of the scene makes it easy to imagine the sound of crunching snow tromping through this icy winterscape."
