Robert F. Blum

The Vintage Festival (Bacchanalia)

15 x 28
Oil on canvas
Framed: 25 x 38
Signed & Dated, l.r., Blum 1881-86, also inscribed, l.l., To my good Alfred as a souvenir of Nov 26,1888

Provenance:
Private Collection, Beverly Hills, CA

Price:
$85,000.00

Notes:
Excellent condition; original canvas, 5 slight punctures, expertly repaired. American (reproduction), 20th Century, applied ornament and gilded, reverse slope frame, by Stanford White.

Alfred Corning Clark built Mendelssohn Music Hall (1890s) on 40th Street, east of Broadway, NYC; in addition to his interest in music, he was a patron of the visual arts. As part of the decoration of the interior of Mendelssohn Hall, as the new building on 40th Street was called, Clark commissioned Robert Frederick Blum, muralist, colorist, and illustrator, to do twin panels for either side of the proscenium arch in the concert hall. The first, begun in 1893 and completed in 1895, was called "Moods of Music." The frieze was 50 feet long and 12 feet high. Later, Blum completed the companion piece, a canvas of equal size entitled "Feast of Bacchus."

The Blum murals were lost when the building was destroyed in 1912, and speculation as to what had become of them engaged the interest of the Club members for years. Then, just before the centennial jubilee concert in 1965, the murals were found in the vaults of the Brooklyn Museum and were placed on display in the entrance hall of the Museum directly above the main portals.

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Robert F. Blum
1857 -1903

Robert Frederick Blum was an active and successful artist, versatile in a number of media and highly regarded as a pastelist. His vibrant and atmospheric work, which incorporated many of impressionism's techniques, helped pave the way in America for acceptance of impressionism.

The Cincinnati in which Blum was born in 1857 was an artistic center, but he received his major inspiration when, like many other American artists of the time, he visited the Centennial Exhibition in 1876 in Philadelphia. There he was very impressed with works by artists of the Romano-Spanish School. He became such an important disciple of the well respected Giovanni Boldini and Mariano Fortuny that he became known as "Blumtuny."

In 1880, he encountered another profound influence when he joined fellow Cincinnatian Frank Duveneck in Venice. Duveneck's group was then associated with James McNeill Whistler. Whistler's pictorial technique, if not his rejection of narrative interest in painting, can be seen reflected in much of Blum's work, and Whistler was a strong influence on Blum's interest in etching and pastel. Blum became president of the Society of Painters in Pastel. Through this society, and with his colleague and friend William Merritt Chase, Blum exerted a perceptible sway over the development of American taste.

Blum's paintings combine energetic and fluid brushwork with great attention to atmosphere and light. His subject matter was often drawn from his travels, first in Europe and later in Japan, where he was one of the first American artists to paint and travel.

He was successful not only as a painter but also as an illustrator and muralist. A series of his illustrations, created during his trip to Japan, was published in Scribner's Magazine, and he demonstrated his skill as a muralist in the wall panels he created for the old Mendelssohn Glee Club Hall in New York City, which were preserved in the Brooklyn Museum.

The Ameya (ca. 1893), oil on canvas, 63.7 x 78.9 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

MEMBERSHIPS:
Associate, National Academy of Design, 1892
National Academy of Design, 1893
Society of American Artist
American Water Color Society
Society of Mural Painters
Society of Painters in Pastel

EXHIBITED:
Paris Exposition, 1889 (medals), 1900 (medal)
Pan American Exposition, Buffalo, 1901 (gold medal)

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS:
Brooklyn Museum
Cincinnati Art Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City

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