American Art and Pennsylvania Impressionists Featuring the Papageorge Family Collection

Note

Born in Elgin, Illinois in 1876, Peterson moved to New York at the age of 18, studying composition under Arthur Wesley Dow at the Pratt Institute. Following graduation and a series of teaching positions—as well as additional coursework at the city’s Art Students League—Peterson embarked for Europe, and commenced a decades-long love affair with traveling, painting, and living abroad. Alongside stints in London, Paris and Madrid (where she encountered the brilliant coloring and spontaneous brushwork of Spanish master, Joaquín Sorolla), subsequent travels took Peterson to points even farther afield, from Egypt and Algeria to Turkey and Yugoslavia. By 1907, she was spending extended periods in Venice; thereafter, loosely-rendered depictions of the city's canals, bridges, gondolas, and architecture assumed pride of place within her oeuvre.

The present painting depicts one of Venice's most distinctive landmarks, the Ponte dei Sospiri or Bridge of Sighs. Spanning the Rio di Palazzo, the white limestone walkway connects the Prigioni Nuove (or New Prison) with the adjacent Doge's Palace. (The bridge was so named after the sighs of convicted prisoners who passed between the Palace's interrogation rooms and their prison cells. Through tiny windows and stone bars, they were treated to one final glimpse of freedom.) With animated brushwork, a palette of amethyst, cool greens and blues, and shimmering lighting effects, Peterson captures the canal in early evening shadow. Off in the distance, sunlight rakes across windowed façades. As in many of the artist's Venetian scenes, viewers are positioned just above water level–here, atop the Ponte della Paglia, once the oldest stone bridge in city. The canal's mirror-like reflections give way to a gondolier and his passengers and, beyond, to the Ponte de Canonica teeming with life.