RSW's Diary Comments

"Painted in winter 1942. A repainting made in the studio from an old canvas of the same size. The old one I destroyed. The brook is the Apple Valley Brook, near the first bridge at the foot of the road in Ashfield."

Evening Mists, 1945

Comments on the back of a sepia print:

"Painted in early spring before direct greens come to the woods. Colors surrounding brook are neutral dull greens, violets, and pinks. Water very iridescent, sparkling, moving. A lively canvas, but very peaceful and liveable. Almost no direct green in this."

Editor's Note:

Repainting canvases was not an uncommon practice for Woodward but what is unusual is the number of paintings, he held in store for nearly two decades where pulled out and repainted between the years 1937 and 1945. There are more than a dozen we know of and wonder how many others we do not know about. The artist also began making what he called "composite" paintings taking a subject he liked and adding features and elements from other painting to compose a scene...

We have pieced together what influenced these unusual patterns and we believe it has to do with the sudden passing of Francis Garvan eight days after buying Enduring New England. Mr. Garvan commissioned Woodward to paint historic churches of New England. Upon his death, Mrs. Garvan refused to honor the commission. The two men were just a few years apart in age and there is a dramatic change in behavior by Woodward. He stopped traveling as much and focused on immediate subjects surrounding him. The year 1937 was ALSO the year he began making his Window Picture Paintings, on a regular basis, which he can do without leaving his studio. One of the churches Woodward made for Mr. Garvan's commission, Village Church in Winter was a re-make of another early 1920s painting and the first canvas of his repainted paintings. As far as we know, ALL originals canvases repainted during this time were destroyed. BELOW is a newspaper clipping where this original appears hanging over the posed artist in 1922 ⮟

May 16, 1922, Newspaper clip-
ping of RSW under original canvas

The 1922 clipping to the right was once thought to be the painting The Brook, however, a note in RSW's handwriting puts that painting location at "Clock Hollow" in Buckland, whereas this painting is in Ashfield.

Although we can't get a better image of the clipping, our side-by-side comparison below shows enough evidence to believe this may well be the original painting RSW refers to in his dairy comments.

Side by side comparison of Rushing Brook with painting in clipping