Evening - Autumn

Alexander Wyant was born in Tuscarawas County, Ohio. Receiving little encouragement in the arts as a young man, he first worked as a harness maker and sign painter. Undeterred in his desire to become an artist, he traveled to Karlsruhe, Germany, and studied under the Alpine landscape painter Hans Gude (1825-1903). He soon became frustrated with the strict and unimaginative approach of the curriculum and left the course early to move to London. He was full of admiration for the master landscape artists John Constable and James M. W. Turner, who made an irreversible impression on the young artist.

Wyant then moved to New York and became an early success, conquering the crowded field of American landscape artists. By age thirty-three he was elected a full member of the National Academy of Art. Along with George Inness, whose work influenced him greatly, he reached the top of his profession, but his road was paved with obstacles. In 1873, while traveling to Arizona and New Mexico as an expedition guest of the government, he suffered a stroke that paralyzed his right hand. He prevailed and trained himself to paint with his left hand. The effects of the stroke would forever cloud his life, causing a persistent melancholy in his paintings. Around 1875 Wyant began to paint the landscape of the Adirondack Mountains, and in 1889 he settled in the Catskills.

The Union League Club painting is likely inspired by the Catskills landscape. Autumn is not about a specific place, rather an impression and feeling of space. The sky is darkening, signaling the shortening of sunlight hours. Foliage deepens in color, evolving to a soft palette of brown, bronze, and deep orange. The ground shows green grass dissipating, overtaken by shades of brown. A sliver of water settles in the horizon.

The Club purchased this work only three years after the artist’s death.