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Frank Weston Benson

Summer, 1909

Description

Maker

  • Frank Weston Benson, 1862-1951, American

Title

Summer

Year

1909

Medium

Oil on canvas

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • oil paint

Supports

  • canvas

Dimensions

91.8 x 113 cm (36 1/8 x 44 1/2 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Signed LL:F.W. Benson, 1909

Type

  • Paintings

Credit

Bequest of Isaac C. Bates

Object Number

13.912

Projects & Publications

Publications

Teaching Notes/ Imagining the Americas

Read Online

American Impressionism

a New Vision 1880-1900

Remarkable Women of Rhode Island

A Handbook of the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design

Selection VII

American Painting from the Museum's Collection, c.1800-1930

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Making It In America

October 11, 2013 - February 9, 2014

Frank Benson taught at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and gave occasional studio critiques at RISD. That work and income from private commissions permitted him to acquire vacation property on North Haven Island, Maine, where he photographed and made sketches of his daughters and their friends in preparation for this painting of a perfect summer day. Benson used these studies to capture poses, then referenced and combined them as he created the finished work in his studio. His models present an optimistic view of contemporary young womanhood—relaxed, confident, and looking to the future.

Benson’s Summer is incomplete without its frame, impeccably crafted by the Boston firm Foster Brothers to complement the painting. I am attracted to this frame for its brilliant luminosity. To achieve such a dazzling surface, tissue-thin sheets of gold leaf were carefully laid over wood that had been carved, sanded, sealed with rabbit-skin glue, and painted with gesso and reddish clay before it was sized with adhesive. Even today this surface glows, as gold leaf retains its luster indefinitely. Festooned with a chainwork of fruit, foliage, and flowers, the frame also redoubles the painting’s inherent theme of fertility.

Isabella McCormick, RISD (Painting) / Brown BA student, 2015

An American Idyll

April 6, 2007 - January 6, 2008

From the Reserve IV

July 22 - October 2, 1994

Romanticism and Revival

December 4, 1992 - June 26, 1993

Following the Light

September 20 - November 10, 1991

The Ocean

August 17 - October 7, 1990

Summer shows the artist's daughters and their friends on a hillside near his summer home on North Haven Island in Penobscot Bay, Maine. Elisabeth "Betty" Benson and her friend, Anna Hathaway, are seated at the left, while Eleanor Benson stands shielding her eyes from the sun. Benson's niece, Margaret "Gretchen" Strong, is seated to the right. Benson worked from carefully composed photographs, which still exist in albums at the Essex Institute in Salem, Massachusetts, and repeated several of the figures in Summer in later paintings . He was a member of The Ten, a group of American painters whose work reflects the influence of French Impressionism. While Benson captures the effects of natural sunlight and sea air with bright colors and loose brushwork, his figures remain imposing and sculptural.

Selection VII

March 31 - May 8, 1977

Days Gone By

July 1 - September 26, 1971

Exploring America

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in the public domain (CC0 1.0). This object is Summer with the accession number of 13.912. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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