: The Yale Center for British Art will be the first and only US
venue for an exhibition focusing on one of the most original and
important landscape painters and watercolorists of the second
half of the Nineteenth Century. "The Poetry of Truth: Alfred
William Hunt and the Art of Landscape," on view September
18-December 12, is the first major exhibition devoted to Hunt
since the memorial exhibitions following his death in 1896. It
highlights 65 works by Hunt, who struggled for recognition during
his lifetime and whose achievements as an artist have been
undervalued since.
Organized by the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and the Yale Center
for British Art, the show includes watercolors, drawings,
sketchbooks and oil paintings. The exhibition has been curated by
Christopher Newall, an independent art historian and expert on
Hunt; Colin Harrison, assistant keeper in the department of
Western art at the Ashmolean; and Scott Wilcox, curator of prints
and drawings at the Yale Center for British Art.
Born in Liverpool on November 15, 1830, Hunt was the son of a
landscape painter and drawing master. In 1848 he was admitted as
a classics scholar at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and in 1851
he won the Newdigate Prize for his poem "Nineveh." He was already
a painter, exhibiting with the Liverpool Academy from the age of
16 and becoming a member of that institution after his graduation
from Oxford.
Inspired by the writings of John Ruskin and adopting his
principle of "truth to nature," Hunt developed an intensely
detailed and highly individual form of Pre-Raphaelite observation
of nature in the 1850s. By the end of the decade, he had become a
figure of note on the periphery of the Pre-Raphaelite circle in
London and had begun his long friendship with Ruskin, who praised
the subtlety and keenness of observation evident in Hunt's
landscapes, but warned the young artist against excessive detail.
"The best landscape I have ever seen in the exhibition for many a
day - uniting most subtle finish and watchfulness of nature, with
real and rare power of composition." - John Ruskin, Academy
Notes, 1856
Hunt was elected a Fellow of Corpus Christi College in 1857, but
he gave up his academic position in order to marry in 1861 and to
pursue a career as an artist. By the late 1860s, fearing that a
literalness and narrowness of focus had descended on British
landscape painting, he moved away from the brilliant color and
meticulous detail associated with Pre-Raphaelitism. He took up a
more atmospheric and poetic approach to the representation of
nature, inspired by - but never simply imitating - the work of
J.M.W. Turner.
An introverted and diffident man, Hunt was never comfortable with
the commercialism of the Victorian art world or the
self-promotion required of the successful Victorian painter. He
was frustrated by his failure to gain recognition from the Royal
Academy, yet he became one of the most respected members of the
Society of Painters in Water-Colours. Critics regularly cited his
contributions to the society's annual exhibitions as among the
most original landscapes of the age.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a 184-page illustrated
catalog, available in the museum shop; call 203 432 2828 to
order.
The Yale Center for British Art (YCBA), 1080 Chapel Street,
houses the largest and most comprehensive collection of British
art outside the United Kingdom. Admission is free and hours are
Tuesday through Saturday, 10 am to 5 pm; Sunday, noon to 5 pm.
For information, www.yale.edu/ycba.
