RSW's Diary Comments

"Prior to 1930. A painting of old maples made from Hezekiah Ward's back pasture overlooking the valley to Pocumtuck. This canvas was hung in the home of Robert J. Haeberle and went from there to the home of John Haigis of Greenfield, Mass. for permanent ownership."

Handwritten note on back of sepia print:

"The ancient tree stands guard on a high knoll - with distant hill and lovely opalescent color across the valley (Photograph does not portray too well the feeling of distance in the painting.) Foreground has blue-gray of rock-ledge, soft pink & yellow of weeds & grasses _ Tree itself is in greens - Sky in distance, hazy gray-violet and soft blue - "

This painting hangs in a home in Pennsylvania. We appreciate the current owner's graciousness in assisting us with the above picture.

The handwritten note on the back of sepia print.

To the right: Is a picture of the back you the sepia print and it's handwriiten noteby Woodward himself. RSW often wrote descriptions like this because (1) sepias were sent to prospective galleries for exhibit and (2) in the time, sepias images were exclusively black and white.

Transcription of the note:

"Across the Valley" 25" x 30"
"The ancient tree stands guard on a high knoll - with distant hill in lovely opalescent color across the valley (Photograph does not portray too well the feeling of distance in the painting.) Foreground has blue-gray of rock-ledge, soft pink & yellow of weeds & grasses - Tree itself is ni greens - sky in distance, hazy gray-violet and soft blue -"

Opalescent (o-pal-es-cent):

adjective
"showing varying colors as an opal does."

Unnamed: Across the Valley

There is another painting attributed with the same name as this painting. However, we believe that the other painting was mistaken for this one given (1) both were painted around the same time, and (2) share a similar subject matter. Still, this painting his a pretty clear history and provenance while the other has no name on its stretcher nor any record in RSW's painting diaries or exhibition records. Below, from Unnamed: Across the Valley's webpage is our account of how we believe this occurred:

Excerpt from Unnamed: Across the Valley's

"We first learned of this painting in 1997 (5 yrs prior to the start of the website) when it came up for auction in New Hampshire. They named it "Across the Valley" and it has stuck despite having no name written on its stretcher. It is possible that the auction house used the 1970 published catalogue of RSW complete works list compiled by the Deerfield Academy's American Studies Group to determine its name. Unfortunately for them, this painting happens to be the ONLY painting Woodward did of this particular size (23 x 23) and so they could not find an exact match. Except, that in and around the same time period (1920 - '23) a painting titled "Across the Valley" was on that list. This was clearly a valley painting and so we believe they took the time period and appropriate-ness of the subject and assigned it." BCM