Three Generations of Wyeths

I surrendered to a world of my imagination, reenacting all those wonderful tales my father would read aloud to me. I became a very active reader, especially history and Shakespeare. – Andrew Wyeth

 

The Biggs Museum of American Art in Dover, Delaware, has put together an exhibit of more than seventy paintings done by three generations of The Wyeth family.

 

Works by N.C. Wyeth, his son, Andrew Wyeth, his daughter Henriette Wyeth Hurd and his grandson Jamie Wyeth are included in the exhibit. Andrew Wyeth’s only grandchild, Victoria Browning Wyeth, will be at the Biggs Museum to present a lecture about her grandfather and his work.

 

Wyeths: Three Generations: Works from the Bank of America Collection will be on display from November 2, 2023 through February 11, 2024.

 

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A painting by N.C. Wyeth, bought at a thrift store in Manchester, New Hampshire for $4, was sold at Bonhams Skinner auction house for $191,000 last month. The buyer, who chooses to remain anonymous, bought the painting for the frame, and stored it away in a closet for a few years.

 

After doing an unsuccessful internet search, she posted an image of the work on Facebook and was referred to the Brandywine Museum, where it was identified as an original, long-lost illustration by N.C. Wyeth.

 

The painting is one of four illustrations that N.C. Wyeth did for a 1939 edition of Helen Hunt Jackson's book Ramona and sent to the book’s publisher. It’s not certain what happened to the painting after the book was published and only one other of the four illustrations have been found, so far. 

 

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 A look at some unusual work by Andrew Wyeth is on view at the Brandywine Museum of Art in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, the township where Wyeth was born and where he died.

 

The artworks from the Wyeth estate are divided between the Brandywine Museum and the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine. Although his paintings have been exhibited around the world, Wyeth rarely traveled outside of, or far from, Chadds Ford and Cushing, Maine. 

 

Although he is best known for his realistic landscapes and portraits, the current show at the Brandywine includes some abstract paintings that have never been shown in public before. 

 

The show’s curator, William L. Coleman, Ph.D., who is the Wyeth Foundation Curator and Director of the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Study Center, said, “One of the interesting things about this show is all of the work is untitled. That’s significant in “Wyeth World." What that means is that Andrew Wyeth never judged them to be saleable objects. It was a private practice. It also says that Betsy James Wyeth, who was the key artistic advisor/director, never gave them a title. It’s a secret, private practice was made for personal pleasure.”

 

Abstract Flash: Unseen Andrew Wyeth is currently on display and will run through February 18, 2024. 

 

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October 26, 2023