Sunshine and Mist, Quebec

Harrison holds the honor of being among the first American artists to have sold a painting to the French Government. His skillful and sensitive rendering of atmosphere and light in Sunlight and Mist, Quebec affirms his abilities. He came from a family of artists—his brothers Thomas Alexander and Butler were respected marine and genre painters respectively. Harrison benefitted from famous artistic mentors, heeding the advice of John Singer Sargent to leave Philadelphia for Paris in 1877. There he studied with Carolus-Durand and Alexandre Cabanel, who instructed him in academic and figure painting. While in France, he learned from other artists the method of plein-air, and forever changed his artistic course. Once back in the United States, after an interlude in Santa Barbara, California, Harrison worked in New York City and Quebec--the scene of this work and where he often wintered. He taught summer school in Woodstock, New York and remained there from 1897 until his death. His lectures given at the school became the basis for a book, Landscape Painting, that was published in 1909.

The Union League Club Chicago painting represents an impression viewed from the tower room of the Fort of Frontenac, overlooking the St. Lawrence River in Quebec. The tonalist and atmospheric paintings of George Inness (also in the Union League Collection), inspired him, and he personally knew Inness. Harrison practiced the "lost edge" technique whereby he avoided sharp lines and edges. Through this he created this poetic interpretation of what was a cold, urban, and gritty scene, attesting to his mastery of the landscape genre.