The New York Window

Childe Hassam

National Gallery of Art

Shown from the knees up, a woman wearing an ice- and teal-blue dress and shawl sits in front of a window in this vertical painting. The scene is painted loosely with brushstrokes especially evident in the clothing and background. The woman takes up the bottom left quadrant of the composition. Her knees are angled to our right, and she looks down in that direction. She is lit from our left so her face falls into shadow, but her profile is outlined against the sheer curtains hanging behind her. Her head bows slightly, and she has rosy cheeks, a rounded nose, and her lips are closed. Her brown hair is pulled loosely back and up. Her arms lie limp, one in her lap and the other, closer to us, alongside her body. A jewel-toned blue shawl is wrapped around her shoulders over a paler, long dress. The woman sits back in a window seat or bench against a leaf-green cushion. A turquoise-blue dish on the bench to our right is piled high with yellow and red fruit and glassy green grapes. Along the left edge of the canvas, next to the woman, white streaks suggest a cloth next to a form with honey-yellow specks painted on a bronze-orange shape, perhaps a basket. Translucent yellow curtains hang across the windows, which fill the top two-thirds of the canvas. Shapes painted in shades of smoky blue and peach outside suggest buildings and skyscrapers. A russet-red curtain is pulled to the right. The artist signed and dated the lower left corner, “Childe Hassam 1912.”