White, Edwin D.:

$1,500 · Offered by William Reese Company

[AUTOGRAPH LETTER, SIGNED, FROM NOTED HISTORICAL PAINTER EDWIN WHITE TO LEGENDARY LANDSCAPE PAINTER JOHN FREDERICK KENSETT, DISCUSSING ART, ARTISTS, AND LIFE IN ... A rich and fascinating letter from Edwin White, one of the most gifted American historical painters of the 19th century, to his friend John Frederick Kensett, legendary Hudson River School landscape painter. White's letter, written early in his career while studying in Paris, is a wonderful summary of artists and exhibitions in Paris, with in-depth critiques of paintings by a number of emerging 19th-century French artists.After apologies for taking so long to write, White remarks:"You will undoubtedly expect me to say something of art and artists in Paris, but my situation is not unlike that of a landscape painter who goes into the country to sketch, he finds so much that he would like to do that for a time he does nothing, or in other words, he finds so much that is grand and beautiful that he finds it difficult to fix upon any one point...but as you already know more of the old masters at the Louvre and the French artists at the Luxembourg than I do, I will pass them over for the present, and give you my impressions so far as I am able, of the pictures which have just been opened for exhibition at the Palais Royal. On entering one is astonished at the immense power in light, shade and colour, and knowledge exhibited in the human figure, one of the finest probably, is a picture of large size by [Charles-Louis] Mü

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