RSW's Diary Comments

Village Street; Sketch- - Woodward used the trees
to the left side of the road of Falling Gold to make what
he called "composite" paintings for a painting titled
Village Street. The sketch is his "mock up" design.

"Painted at northern end of Christian Hill Road. Bought by Grand Central Art Galleries in 1933 for their annual Founders Show, pictures from which are drawn by lot by patrons. Do not know who owns it but this could probably be learned from records of the G.C.A.G. in New York, 15 Vanderbilt Ave."

Editor's Note:

We have three notes on this painting...
   First, is that this is Founder's Day painting bought by the Grand Central Art Gallery association and sold through the organization for their own profit. An important distinction due to the selectiveness of the gallery to pick the highest quality of paintings to feature.
   Second, Much to his chagrin, RSW never knew who purchased the painting for the G.C.A.G. because they protected the buyer's privacy. It is not RSW's sale. Its location is still unknown to this day.
   Third, the location of Christian Hill Road is believed to be in Colrain, MA, north of Buckland, east of Heath, and up high in the hills near the Vermont line. As far as we know, this is the only known painting RSW painted in Colrain which was once the hometown of fellow artist Gardner Symons. Symons once helped Woodward and may have mentored him between 1918 and 1920 early in Woodward's career. We suspect that RSW avoided Colrain in deference to Symons. Symons passed in 1930.

The artist used the trees he had painted on the left side Falling Gold and the right side of Heath Village to create Village Street. Woodward combined the scene of Heath Village with the trees left-side tree line of Falling Gold. He made very few of these "composite" paintings. Most made between the years 1938 and 1945. Heath Village was made in 1943.

A side by side comparison of the trees of Falling Gold and Village Street
Below: Heath Village makes up the right side of the of the painting.

Heath Village makes up the right side of the of the painting.

While we have the sepia print of Falling Gold, the only sense we have of the coloring and gold of this painting is found in a "composite" painting made by RSW named, Village Street. Woodward used the tree line on the left of the painting to compose Village Street. The gold suggest the painting is a mid-to-late September, early October painting. Note the hints of red starting to enter what are probably maple trees, that go from green to gold, to orange, then red and in some cases show all for colors at the same time making maples perhaps the most beautiful of all the foliage trees.