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TheodoreRobinson

Theodore Robinson was an American painter best known for his Impressionist landscapes. He was one of the first American artists to take up Impressionism in the late 1880s, visiting Giverny and developing a close friendship with Claude Monet. Several of his works are considered masterpieces of American Impressionism.
Robinson was born in Irasburg, Vermont. His family moved to Evansville, Wisconsin, and Robinson briefly studied art in Chicago. In 1874 he journeyed to New York City to attend classes at the National Academy of Design and the Art Students League.
In 1876 he traveled to Paris to study under Carolus-Duran and at the École des Beaux-Arts, with Jean-Léon Gérôme. He first exhibited his paintings at the 1877 Salon in Paris, and spent the summer of that year at Grez-sur-Loing.
After trips to Venice and Bologna, he returned to the United States in 1879 for several years. In 1881 he moves into a studio in New York and becomes a professional painter and art teacher. During this time Robinson painted in a realist manner, loosely brushed but not yet impressionistic, often depicting people engaged in quiet domestic or agrarian pursuits.
In 1884 Robinson returned to France where he lived for the next eight years, visiting America only occasionally. Robinson gravitated to Giverny, which had become a center of French impressionist art under the influence of Claude Monet.
Historians are unclear when Robinson met Monet, but by 1888 their friendship was enough for Robinson to move in next door to the famous impressionist. Robinson's art shifted to a more traditional impressionistic manner during this time, likely due to Monet's influence. While a number of American artists had gathered at Giverny, none were as close to Monet as Robinson. Monet offered advice to Robinson, and he likewise solicited Robinson for opinions on Monet's own works in progress.
Not only did he take to heart Monet´s theoretical admonitions and his requirement to portray the beauties and mystery of nature in a manner stringently truthful to one's personal vision, but he also studied works that were available to him in "The Master´s" studio. For instance, Capri, painted in 1890, was probably inspired by Monet´s paintings of the cliffs at Varengeville, Pourville, and Etretat and the rocks at Bell-Ile of the early 1880s.
At Giverny, Robinson painted what art historians regard as some of his finest works. These depicted the surrounding countryside in different weather, in the plein air tradition, sometimes with women shown in leisurely poses. An example of his mature work during this period is La Débâcle (1892) in the collection of Scripps College, Claremont California.
Robinson left France and Monet for the final time in 1892, although he meant to return. Back in America, Robinson obtained a teaching post with the Brooklyn Art School and conducted summer classes in Napanoch, New York, near the Catskill Mountains, where he painted several canal scenes. He also taught at Evelyn College in Princeton, New Jersey, and later at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia.
With New York City as his base, Robinson circulated among a growing number of American artists pursuing Impressionism. He was particularly close to John Henry Twachtman and Julian Alden Weir, and spent time at the nearby Cos Cob Art Colony in Connecticut. There he painted a series of boat scenes at the Riverside Yacht Club which have come to be regarded as among his finest works.
While his reputation as an important American Impressionist was growing, Robinson still needed to teach to support himself. He also harbored doubts about the quality of his work.
Throughout his career, Theodore Robinson kept meticulous diaries, but only the last several years of the diaries are known to exist. These are in the collection of the Frick Art Reference Library in New York and available to scholars. The art historian Sona Johnson, of the Baltimore Museum of Art, plans to publish an annotated edition of the Robinson diaries.
In the last year of his life he was asked to contribute to the book of essays titled "Modern French Masters" by the editor and art historian John Charles Van Dyke. He wrote an essay on the Barbizon painter Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and, because of his friendship with the French Impressionist, he wrote and illustrated the essay on Claude Monet. The book was published in 1896 and his illustration of Monet was featured in the exhibition "In Monet's Light."
In 1895, Robinson enjoyed a productive period in Vermont, and in February 1896 he wrote to Monet about returning to Giverny, but in April he died of an acute asthma attack in New York City. He was buried in his hometown of Evansville, Wisconsin. He was 43 years old.
Today Robinson's paintings are in the collections of many major museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City; the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; and the Art Institute of Chicago.

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Apple Blossoms

Afternoon Shadows

At the Fountain

Bouquet of Flowers. Chrysanthemums in a China Vase

The Bridge at Giverny

Figure in a Landscape

Improvisation

The Anchorage, Cos Cob

In the Garden 1

The Young Violinist (aka Margaret Perry)

Giverny 2

French Village

A Sweet Girl Graduate

Bird's Eye View.Giverny

Blossoms at Giverny

Beacon Street, Boston

Boats at a Landing

Afternoon Shadows 1

Boats at a Landing 1

Barbizon

Bridge near Giverny

Harbor Scene

By the River

Autumn Sunlight

The Forge (aka An Apprentice Blacksmith)

In the Orchard 1

Creek at Low Tide

Houses in France

Giverny 3

Valley of the Seine 1

By the Brook

Giverny 1

On the Tow-Path - A Halt

At the Fountain 1

Evening on the Canal

A King's Daughter (aka Girl with Lilies)

A Farm House in Giverny

Angelus

La Roche-Guyon

Boy in a Boat Fishing

Watching the Cows

Girl Raking Hay

The Red Gown (also known as His Favorite Model)

Young Girl with Dog

Two in a Boat

Nettie Reading

Girl in Red at the Piano

The Wedding March

The Young Violinist (also known as Margaret Perry)

Sunset at Arbonne

The Lane

Willows and Wildflowers

Church in Snow

Girl with Puppies

Valley of the Seine from Giverny Heights

Forest landscape Sun

Springtime

At the Piano

The Old Mills of Brookville (also known as Vieux Moulin)

The Wedding March

Girl in Red, Sewing

Old Church at Giverny

Mother and Child by the Hearth

Hillside in Giverny, France

Val_d-Arconville

In the Grove

Road by the Mill

Water Lilies

In the Garden

La Vachère

Watering Pots

Stepping Stones

The Watering Place

Giverny

The Cowherd

La Debacle aka Marie at the Little Bridge

Girl Sewing (also known as The Layette or The Seamstress)

Market in the Normandy

The Large Oak Tree, Forest of Fontainebleau

In a Daisy Field

The Farmer's Daughter

Italian Landscape with a Fountain

Country road

On the Cliff: A Girl Sewing

Miss Motes and Her Dog Shep

Flower of Memory

A Rainy Day, New York

The Forge (also known as An Apprentice Blacksmith)

Lady in Red

The E. M. J. Betty

The Watering Pots

Sunset in the forest

Mother and Child

Path in Frascati

The Little Fisherman

Girl at Piano

Daisy Field, Nantucket

Normandy Farm, A Characteristic Bit, Givernyy

October Sunlight

The Peasant Girl

French Farmhouse

On the Canal (of Port Ben Series)

Garden Bench with Ferns

Place St. Sulpice, Paris (unfinished)

The Red House

Road in the forest of Fontainebleau

Oxen Ploughing (also known as Springtime, Vermont)

The Miller's Daughter

Exit drill Fontainebleau, sunset

House with Scaffolding

Peeling Apples

On the Canal

Street in Barbizon at Sunset

In the Sun

Spring

View of the plain of Montmartre X effect of storm

Venetian Fruit Shop

Morning

Gathering Plums

Virginia Woods

Study in the forest of Fontainebleau

House in Virginia

Giverny

Saint Martin's Summer, Giverny

Winter Sunlight, Barbizon

Man with Scythe

Willows

Capri

The Ship Yard

Study for 'Valley of the Seine from the Giverny Heights'

Woman Sewing, Giveny

Two in a Boat

Pere Trognon and His Daughter at the Bridge

Fifth Avenue at Madison Square

Avenue, Forest Isle Adam

Potato Harvest

Mills of Thiers

The Duck Pond

The Layette

On the Canal

Valley of the Seine, Giverny

View of the Seine

Edge of the loire

Edge of river

La débácle

Yellow Apples

Winter in New York City

Winter Landscape

The Forest of Fontainebleau

Farmhouse at Grez

Valley of the Seine

Clumps of trees along a river

Willows (also known as Enn Picardie)

Village under the trees

The collier's hut

Landscape

Moonrise

In the Orchard

Normandy farms

On the Tow-Path - A Helt

Landscape with a church

Riverside

Port Ben - Delaware and Hudson Canal

Port Ben, Delaware and Hudson Canal

Giverny from the River Epte

Girl with Goat

Low Tide, The Riverside Yacht Club

Gossips

World's Columbian Exposition

Port Ben, Delaware and Hudson Canal

From the Hill, Giverny

Oxen

Gateway

The pond

Woman with White Cap

The pond at the foot of the hill

Twilight in Sologne

Grain Field, N. J.

Farm Among Hills

The passer

Mountain landscape near Fontainebleau

Landscape

Self Portrait

Park Scene

Sea

The Ferry

Loire

The hill

At the Piano

Portrait of Madame Baudy

Marshland in Les Landes

Valley in the Auvergne Mountains

Man with Sythe

Look at Barbizon

Sunset

Meadows crossed by a river

Landscape

Evening at the Lock

On the Housatonic River, Connecticut

Last houses of Port en Bessin (Calvados)

Moonlight, Giverny

The avenue of chestnut trees

Mountain Landscape with fisherman

Mediterranean View

Nantucket Pump

Summer Hilside, Giverny

Cows in the mare

Nantucket

Moonlight, Giverny - Study

Coal Schooner Unloading

The pond, stormy sky

Solitude Park Chamagnieu

The board of Bellecroix

Plain in front of the Pyrenees

The avenue of chestnut trees

Low Tide

Boat near a shore lined with trees

Two Boats

Out of the forest of Fontainebleau

Alley chestnut from the castle Shoes

Study of rocks

The pond near the road

The Forest in Winter

Spinning

View of the belfry of Orleans

Nantucket Girl

Landscape

Moon Rise: Rochers Brutées

The Seine at Villeneuve St. Georges

Landscape

Rocky valley

Boat on a river lined with trees

The Forest in Winter

Sunset on a plain

Landscape

Plain

The oak tree crashed into the forest of Fontainebleau

Village entrance

The campaign at sunrise

The plain of Barbizon

Sketch for The Alley Chesnut

Carrier bundles of wood on the edge

Paysage in Auvergne

Paysage in Auvergne (environs de Puy)

Lowland landscape

Paysage of Auvergne

Winter, Giverny

Fontainebleau

A path in the forest

Trees

Landscape

Landscape Sketch