Childe Hassam - Allies Day, May 1917 [1917]

Childe Hassam - Allies Day, May 1917 [1917], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

Hassam had studied in Paris from 1886-1889 and was strongly influenced by the impressionists. In many respects, Allies Day resembles the vibrant boulevard paintings of Monet and Pissarro. Like these contemporary French artists, Hassam selected a high vantage point overlooking a crowded urban thoroughfare to achieve an illusion of dramatic spatial recession. But, rather than using daubs of shimmering pigment to dissolve form, he applied fluid parallel paint strokes to create an architectonic patterning. Although he shared the impressionists' interest in bright colours, broken brushwork, and modern themes, Hassam's overall approach was less theoretical and his pictorial forms remained far more substantial than those of his European contemporaries.

[Oil on canvas, 92.7 x 76.8 cm]