Anna Dwight Weir Reading a Letter

Julian Alden Weir

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Weir painted this tender depiction of his wife, Anna, just before his full immersion in Impressionism. The precise handling of Anna’s head suggests the influence of sixteenth-century portraits by Hans Holbein, whom Weir admired. The picture-within a- picture device recalls works by Whistler, Degas, and Manet. In 1897, along with Childe Hassam and John H. Twachtman, Weir would spearhead the creation of Ten American Painters, an exhibiting organization that included several other artists committed to Impressionism.

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