Situated in a rust belt town of New Britain CT, the New Britain Museum of American Art was born of an extraordinary legacy, as the Stanley Tool Company, now Stanley Black and Decker, supported the museum from its inception in 1903.
In the 1940 when regionalism was overshadowed by the abstraction at the Whitney Museum, artists such as Thomas Hart Benton arranged for some of their larger murals to be sold by the Whitney to the New Britain, which in turn opened up another unique legacy because a pupil of Bentons became famous as well, Jackson Pollock.
By the late 1940's, 50's and 60's the museum turned to the under valued works of the Hudson River School aquiring along the way paintings such as Frederic Church's materpiece Haying near West Rock, a tour de force that were it on the market today it would smash the price records of the 19th century American artists and likely wind up near the French Impressionists. This isn't to say museums are about value, but quality. Constrast that to what we have seen in what became a long running joke here at AAD, the absurd production by Phillip Mould called "Fake or Fortune" as a London shark sees if he can get something on the cheap or play up the greed on camera of the owners of a likely forgery for the inevitable dashing of hopes, it simply is revolting to see unfold.
An American alternative to that approach was established by the Israel Sack furniture specialists who wrote a comprehensive guide to American furniture, simply titled, "Good, Better, Best," it teaches a standard of seeking out greatness, not questionable merch. This, the New Britain Museum, is where great things are to be found, ie, "Best." In the last decade it has been expanded tremendously and its collection is a delight.
Thomas Cole (1801-1848), The Clove, Catskills, 1827,
George Inness (1825-1894), Afternoon, 1846
William T. Ranney (1813-1957), Shad Fishing on the Hudson River, 1854
Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900), West Rock, New Haven, 1849
Paul Weber (1823-1916), Scene Near Fishkill, Hudson River, 1855.* Error as the location is the Croton River, not Fishkill
William J. Bradford (1823-1892), Off the Greenland Coast Under the Midnight Sun, 1873
Martin Heade (1819-1904), Ipswich Marshes, 1867,
Jasper Francis Cropsey (1823-1900), Lake Wawayanda, Sussex County, New Jersey, 1870,
David Johnson (1827-1908), Morning at the Harbor Islands, Lake George 1879
Alfred T. Bricher (1837-1908), Beach Scene at Sunset, 1870
Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902), Seal Rock, Circa 1873
Ralph Blakelock, (1849-1919), Indian Encampment
Winslow Homer (1836-1909), Battle of the Wilderness, 1864, American Civil War
F. Childe Hassam (1858-1935), Le Jour du Grand Prix (On the Day of the Grand Prix) 1887
Theodore Robinson (1852-1896), Snowey Morning, Union Square, 1895
Willard Metcalf (1858-1925), Mountain Laurel, 1905, Old Lyme CT
Willard Metcalf (1858-1925), November Mosaic
Frederick Carl Frieseke (1874–1939), Woman with Birdcage, 1910
Richard E. Miller (1875-1943), Summer Bather, 1939
Maurice Prendergast (1858-1924), Salem, MA, 1910-1913
Ernest Lawson (1873-1939), Spring Tapestry, 1930 (Inwood neighborhood of Manhattan)
William Glackens (1870-1938), Washington Square, Winter
George Bellows (1882-1925), The Big Dory, 1913
Rockwell Kent (1882-1971), Toilers of the Sea, 1907
Gifford Beal (1879-1956), Columbus Avenue Elevated Train, New York, 1916
Thomas Hart Benton (1889-1975), Strike Fall River, MA, 1935
Thomas Hart Benton (1889-1975), South Beach, Martha's Vineyard, 1921
Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), T.P. Benton's Boat, Menemsha Pond 1934
Alexander Calder (1898-1976), The Red Candle, 196
ADDRESS
New Britain Museum of American Art
56 Lexington Street
New Britain, CT 06052
You may also like to read:
* Philip Mould Gets his Panties in a Twist
* Artists’ scheme: a good idea at the time, till it dodged own appraisal
