CATALOGUE OF AN EXHIBmON OF Etchings and Drt Points BY CHI LDE HA S S A M (§ FREDERICK KEPPEL & CO. 4 EAST 39YH STREET NEW YORK MARCH 7tH ro 24TH 1923 CArALOGUE OF AN EXHIBITION OF Etchings and Drt Points BT CHILDE HA S SAM NATIONAL ACADEMICIAN MEMBER OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMT OF ARTS AND LETTERS FREDERICK KEPPEL & CO. 4 EAST 39TH STREET NEW YORK MARCH 7TH TO 24TH 1923 February 23, 1923. Dear Hassam: I have been looking at your new plates, and at some of the old ones, which Keppels tell me you are about to show in their gallery. I think it will be a most interesting exhibition, for two reasons: first, because the plates are good, and, second, because they are your own subjects. They are yoUy and that is what most etchers work is not, though that, as you and I know, is the basis of all etching which is worth anything, but most etching is worth nothing! Besides your things are not the products of sudden commissions to fill a long- felt want, or to be in the fashion of the mo- ment, of rapid trips with only time to make bad sketches, often only to buy picture post- cards, and then rush back to try to accomplish the impossible, though the manufacture of such machines may fill the manufacturers’ pockets and fool his public — but the subjects of your plates are the subjects you know, the motives about you that you always have known, and now in your ripe years are able to put on copper when you want and because you know they can only be done by that fascinating, entangling, maddening method — etching! But my dear Hassam, why am I writing this poppy-cock and drivel? You know and I know, and mighty few other of the people who have rushed into art in this country know, that America, our country, is full of subjects, and that our New York is the most marvellous and endless subject on the face of the earth. We have been trying to show this, and teach this, and put our preaching before the blind, the halt, and the thieves we have been the prey of for years, and your show is another proof that New England is worth doing, that there are American women still left who do not look like flappers, that there are other methods besides tracing photographs, of drawing nudes, and that there are other ways and other motives than yours and mine for etching New York. These are the reasons why I like your work, built up “on the knowledge of a life- time,” and not upon expressionism, cubism, incompetence and conceit, the backbone of the rot and rubbish foisted by strange sharpers and incompetents — there are lots of blatant Americans, as they call themselves, among them — fooling the most gullible and igno- rant public in the world, crying they know not why, save as an investment, for art and get- ting artlessness. We also know that James McNeill Whistler is the greatest of etchers, because his aims and his accomplishments were the highest in his practice of “the science of the beautiful” in the science of etching the most perfect and not the easy, empty products of a misspent day. And sure in our convictions and in our beliefs we will go on, my dear Hassam, till the end of the chapter, to the best of our ability, founded upon the traditions of the ages in art, and not upon the latest fake and cut to escape beauty and avoid workj for we know that with- out the highest aims and the hardest work, nothing decent can be done. Most people in art don’t know enough to come in when it rains, or dare to go out for fear they will get their feet wet. And we are also, though that is not our aim, showing the people that they can collect good work without being million- aires, and that if they collect — these collec- tors — the works of their contemporaries rather than confining themselves to the works of their predecessors, they will be doing some- thing for art, something for artists, and some- thing for themselves. We, you and I, in our prints are giving them the chance and are going to go on doing so. Because we love art, and because we love this undiscovered country — our country — which is full of art — though near swamped by artless artfulness. So let us go on together. We started to- gether, we have worked together as friendly . rivals, each in his own way, and we will go on together to the end. Joseph Pennell. HiLDE H ASSAM IS, in his rare moods, an impressionist of remarkable abil- ity — which appeals strongly to all good painters. I have always felt that so direct an observer would add a new note in etching, and I have, with others in the past several years, tried to awaken his interest in the needle. He now has produced in this line much that needs no words to recommend, and I heartily wish him the success that is his due. J. Alden Weir. \ ► ( I CATALOGUE 1 The Athenaeum, Portsmouth 2 The Chimneys, Portsmouth 3 Sunset, Constable’s Hook 4 Cos Cob, Conn. 5 The Old Toll Bridge 6 Palmer’s Dock, Cos Cob 7 Elms in May 8 The Dutch Door 9 The White Kimono 10 The Steps 11 The Writing Desk 12 The Old House, Cos Cob 13 Toby’s, Cos Cob 14 Old Lace 15 Cos Cob Dock 16 Portrait 17 Calvary Church in Snow 18 The Church Across the Way 19 Battery Park 20 Washington’s Birthday : Fifth Avenue and 23rd Street 21 Church Doorway, Snow 22 Fifth Avenue, Noon 23 The Waning Moon 24 Nocturne: Cos Cob 25 Portsmouth Doorway 26 Newport Harbor 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 Newfields, N. H. John Burroughs Self-Portrait Helen Burke Polly Kane Easthampton Long Island Landscape Water Mill, L. I. Hickories in a Hayfield Midsummer The Deep Sea Bathers C. H. 1920 Anna The Hay Barn The Church Tower, Portsmouth Lyon Gardiner House, Easthampton Old Doorway, Easthampton The Little Willows The Beach, Easthampton Rain Drops and Surf, Easthampton In the Surf, Easthampton Portrait of Mrs. K. Van R. Home Sweet Home Cottage Claire Martel The Surf Swimmer The Stockbridge Bowl Posey Rook The Play of Light r)5 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 My Model in a Fur Coat Sunset, Easthampton Mdlle. Erminie Gagnon The Napoleon Girl Along the Shore My Model Resting Montauk Beach * The Bridge at Old Lyme Flying Swans Mary Mullane The Girl in a Modern Gown * The Harbor of a Thousand Masts, Gloucester A House on Main Street, Easthampton ^ The Birches (Drypoint) The Colonial Church at Gloucester High Tide, Montauk The Little Church Around the Corner I Printing House of William Edwin Rudoe Neva York City