RSW's Diary Comments

Snowing on the Hill Sepia

"Painted in 1940. A painting made from the front window of the Heath Pasture House of the beech tree and ledges during a snow storm, the distant mountains not showing because of the storm, yet done with little falling snow depicted since I tried to get the feeling and essence of a snow storm on this hill rather than the facts. One of my outstanding masterpieces. Sold in June, 1946, to Col. and Mrs. John B. Ackerman (Faith Lunt), 3517 Davis St.,N. W. Washington, D. C."

Comments on the back of a sepia print:

"Extremely decorative. An unusual effect with something of the spirit of a Chinese painting. Subtle, colorful grays in the sky with dull blue horizon. Snow pure white with yellow grasses."

"Hanging in the American Embassy at London."

Editor's Note:

Colonel John Bevier Ackerman, born in Watertown, NY, a graduate of West Point, also attended CalTEch in Pasdena, CA., earning his Masters of Science degree in aeronautics of aviation meteorology. He would rise to the rank of Major General in charge of the Thirteenth Air Force, stationed in the Philippines could have crossed paths with any number of Woodward advocates. General Ackerson did die in England in 1958. He is certainly accomplished enough to add him the our Famous Owners Gallery, and we would if we had more information of some personal contact. Still, we offer you a link to his Wikipedia page below...

Nancy Burncoat's LETTER column, Sunday Telegram (Worchester, MA), June 6, 1941:

"Rather different in tone, but a great favorite, is 'Snowing on the Hill,' in which the lone beech tree defiantly meets New England weather. (This won honorable mention at a Boston exhibit in April.)"

✽  This was how we learned this painting was awarded an Honorable Mention at the 1941, Jordan Marsh Exhibition.

Photo of painting hanging in the American Em-
bassy in London. We do not know who the woman is
or how we have the photo. It could be the Colonel's
second wife Anne, and Ackerman could have sent
the picture to RSW suggesting a relationship.

New York Sun, Friday, March 6, 1942 by H. Mc B.

Robert Strong Woodward, now exhibiting in the Hotel Gotham branch of the Grand Central Galleries, is a factual recorder of landscape, but it must be agreed that he chooses his facts with discretion. He paints in a remarkable region and some of his houses are planted on hills and look out on breath-taking prospects. These same vistas, so alluring in summer yet formidably bleak in winter, but Mr. Woodward gets them into his pictures with staunch integrity. Snowing on the Hill...... is a highly successful picture."

New York Herald Tribune, Sunday, March 8, 1942 by Royal Cortissoz

".....and how the same motive is handled with no suggestion or mere repetition in the most engaging landscape in the show, the Snowing on the Hill. Nor is he unduly preoccupied with detail in his studies of trees. On the contrary, they are painted with sufficient breadth , and it is to be added that he also drives home the large airs, the qualities of space and atmosphere, characteristic of his New England hills."

Boston Sunday Post,April 26, 1942

"....Then turn to Snowing on the Hill with its top of the world feeling, one great tree bowing before the might of the storm. That same hilltop, leading the eye one to a rhythmic pattern of seemingly limitless mountain peaks and changing cloud formations, appears in other canvases under different weather conditions."