Lot 915: Helen Maria Turner (Louisiana, 1858-1958)

Helen Maria Turner (American/Louisiana, 1858-1958) "Late Afternoon", oil on canvas, signed lower left "Helen M. Turner", titled and signed on a fragment of the original liner, 28-1/2" x 46". Presented in a Aesthetic-style giltwood frame. Provenance: Private Collector, Massachusetts. New Orleans Auction galleries is pleased to offer this important example of Helen Maria Turner's work. This painting depicts a subject matter repeated in many of the artist's most successful paintings: a young woman with a garden as the backdrop. It was probably painted around 1916 at Cragsmoor, an American art colony in upstate New York where Turner became a resident in 1910 and where she spent most of her summers until shortly before the sale of her home "Takusan" in 1942. The subject of the "Late Afternoon" is captured in a solitary moment reading a book in a shaded, cool spot of a garden one summer afternoon. True to Turner's impressionistic style, there is a shimmering play of bright sunlight filtered through the trees in the background, while both the figure and the carefully-arranged still life on the table reflect the green/blue hues of the surroundings. This sparse and dramatic play of light and choice of colors is very similar to "Song of Summer", now at The Johnson Collection in Spartanburg, South Carolina. As in other works by Turner, the figure's white dress is executed with loose, long brush strokes in contrast to the fully painted, deeply shadowed face, arms and background. Helen Turner's keen observations of the human form are evident in the graceful lines of the subject's arms revealed beneath the thin fabric of the sleeves, and in the successfully rendered relaxed state of the reader. "Late Afternoon" was painted during the period of Helen Turner's most prolific and successful output, the first quarter of the 20th century, when her inspirational Cragsmoor was teeming with fellow artists. The majority of Helen Turner's paintings produced during this time were large canvasses of women posed in garden settings, along with smaller canvasses of women posed in interior scenes. Paintings from Cragsmoor won her national acclaim. "The Flower Girl", which won the Second Altman Prize, made her the first woman ever to receive any of the renowned Altman prizes. References: Dixon Gallery and Garden, Helen M. Turner, The Woman's Point of View , Exhibition Catalogue, Essay by Maia Jalenak.