Vespers

George Hitchcock

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In reaction to the industrialism and materialism of the modern age, a religious revival about 1900 reflected a general spiritual yearning among artists and their patrons. This painting shows a young Dutch woman walking to evening prayers, or vespers. She wears the typical Zeeland circular, colorful cape and white, transparent headdress that resembles a bridal veil. The religious subject and the detailed rendering of landscape and costume reveal the expatriate Hitchcock's strong dependence on French painters such as Jules Bastien-Lepage. Hitchcock's assimilation of Impressionism is revealed in the unconventional composition, interest in pattern, and intense palette.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art