Since the early twentieth century, John Marin has been considered an important member of the group of modern artists — including Georgia O'Keeffe, Arthur Dove, and Marsden Hartley — who were associated with Alfred Stieglitz and his New York galleries. Although Marin had dabbled in art since childhood and went to work in an architect's office, he did not become a serious artist until he met Stieglitz in 1909, when Marin was almost forty years old. His fame was established early on as one of America's premier watercolorists, and his preferred subject was landscape. Most of his landscapes were done in Maine during the summer; the rest of the year the artist lived in Cliffside, New Jersey, and made frequent trips to New York City.
Brooklyn Bridge, dating about 1912, is of the period of Marin's first truly personal expression. Brightly, wittily, it communicates his sense of the excitement of urban life. In conjunction with one of his Photo-Secession shows, he wrote in "Camera Work" about his New York watercolors: "Shall we consider the life of a great city as confined simply to the people and animals on its streets and in its buildings? Are the buildings themselves dead? . . . I see great forces at work: great movements; the large buildings and the small buildings; the warring of the great and the small; influences of one mass on another greater or smaller mass. Feelings are aroused which give me the desire to express the reaction of these 'pull forces,' those influences which play with one another; great masses pulling smaller masses, each subject in some degree to the other's power. . . . While these powers are at work pushing, pulling, sideways, downwards, upwards, I can hear the sound of their strife and there is great music being played. And so I try to express graphically what a great city is doing. Within the frames there must be a balance, a controlling of these warring, pushing, pulling forces."
the artist (to Stieglitz); Alfred Stieglitz, New York (possibly 1913–d. 1946; his estate, 1946–49; gift to MMA)
New York. An American Place. "Beyond All 'Isms': 20 Selected Marins, 1908–1938," October 15–November 21, 1939, no catalogue.
Museum of Modern Art, New York. "From the Alfred Stieglitz Collection: An Extended Loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art," May 22–August 12, 1951, no catalogue (checklist no. E.L.51.666; loan extended to February 8, 1955).
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," March 1–April 17, 1955, no. 5 (wc) (dated 1910).
Washington, D. C. Phillips Gallery. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," May 15–June 30, 1955, no. 5 (wc).
San Francisco Museum of Art. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," July 19–September 11, 1955, no. 5 (wc).
University of California, Los Angeles. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," September 28–November 9, 1955, no. 5 (wc).
Cleveland Museum of Art. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," November 17, 1955–January 1, 1956, no. 5 (wc).
Minneapolis Institute of Arts. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," February 3–March 20, 1956, no. 5 (wc).
Palm Beach. Society of the Four Arts. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," March 9–20, 1956 (part 1, drawings, etchings and watercolors); March 23–April 1, 1956 (part 2, oils), no. 5 (wc).
University of Georgia, Athens. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," May 1956, no. 5 (wc).
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "John Marin Memorial Exhibition," June 13–July 29, 1956, no. 5 (wc).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Fourteen American Masters: Paintings from Colonial Times to Today," October 16, 1958–January 4, 1959, no catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Three Centuries of American Painting," April 9–October 17, 1965, unnum. checklist.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Paintings, Drawings and Watercolors from the Museum's Collections," October 1–December 7, 1969, no catalogue.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "John Marin / 1870–1953: A Centennial Exhibition," July 7–August 30, 1970, no. 30.
San Francisco. M. H. de Young Memorial Museum. "John Marin / 1870–1953: A Centennial Exhibition," September 20–November 7, 1970, no. 30.
The Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego. "John Marin / 1870–1953: A Centennial Exhibition," November 28, 1970–January 3, 1971, no. 30.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "John Marin / 1870–1953: A Centennial Exhibition," February 18–March 28, 1971, no. 30.
Washington. National Collection of Fine Arts. "John Marin / 1870–1953: A Centennial Exhibition," April 23–June 6, 1971, no. 30.
Paris. Centre National d'Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou, Musée National d'Art Moderne. "Paris—New York," June 1–September 19, 1977, unnumbered cat. (p. 250).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Paintings and Watercolors by John Marin," February 3–March 29, 1981, no catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Selection Three: Twentieth-Century Art," October 22, 1985–January 26, 1986, no catalogue.
Canberra. Australian National Gallery. "20th Century Masters from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York," March 1–April 27, 1986, unnumbered cat. (p.48).
Brisbane. Queensland Art Gallery. "20th Century Masters from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York," May 7–July 1, 1986, unnumbered cat.
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. "Selections and Transformations: The Art of John Marin," January 28–April 15, 1990, unnumbered cat. (fig. 116).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "John Marin's New York: 1910–1936," August 23–November 9, 1997, no catalogue.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "The American Century: Art and Culture, 1900–2000. Part 1: 1900–1950," April 23–August 22, 1999, unnumbered cat. (fig. 204).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Stieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe," October 13, 2011–January 2, 2012, no. 120.
E[manuel]. M. Benson. John Marin: The Man and His Work. Washington, D.C., 1935, p. 35.
Martha Davidson. "Marin: Master of a Minor Medium." Art News 35 (October 24, 1936), p. 12, ill.
Edward Alden Jewell. "John Marin's Art in Two Exhibitions." New York Times (October 17, 1939), p. 29.
Howard Devree. "Over A Generation: Two Current Exhibitions That Emphasize the Expansion of American Art." New York Times (May 27, 1951), p. 78.
Henry Geldzahler. American Painting in the Twentieth Century. New York, 1965, pp. 63–64, ill.
Sheldon Reich. John Marin: Oils, Watercolors, and Drawings Which Relate to His Etchings. Philadelphia, 1969, no. 14.
Sheldon Reich. "John Marin: Paintings of New York, 1912." American Art Journal 1 (Spring 1969), p. 48, fig. 6.
Sheldon Reich. John Marin: A Stylistic Analysis and Catalogue Raisonné. Tucson, 1970, vol. 1, pp. 40, 59, vol. 2, p. 362, fig. 12.11.
Marshall B. Davidson. The American Heritage History of the Artists' America. New York, 1973, pp. 286–87, ill. (color), dates it 1910.
Waldo Frank, Lewis Mumford, Dorothy Norman, Paul Rosenfeld, and Harold Rugg, ed. America and Alfred Stieglitz: A Collective Portrait. Rev. ed (1st ed., 1934). Millerton, N. Y., 1979, unpaginated, fig. 78.
Hilton Kramer. "Art View: A Dash of Marin at The Met." New York Times (March 1, 1981), pp. D1, D27.
Klaus Kertess. Marin in Oil. Exh. cat., Parrish Art Museum. Southhampton, N. Y., 1987, p. 29, fig. 12.
Oswaldo Rodriguez Roque et al. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 9, The United States of America. New York, 1987, p. 115, colorpl. 86.
Richard F. Shepard. "Seeing the Evolution of New York City Through Artists' Eyes." New York Times (March 20, 1987), p. C26.
Paul Richard. "Mixing It Up At the Metropolitan: Standards & Surprises at the Museum's New Wallace Wing." Washington Post (February 1, 1987), p. F9.
John Loughery. "Early Moderns: Benton, Marin, Spencer." Hudson Review 43 (Autumn 1990), p. 464.
Martha Tedeschi and Kristi Dahm. John Marin's Watercolors: A Medium for Modernism. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, 2010, p. 116, fig. 91.
Jessica Murphy inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, pp. 164–65, 267–68, no. 120, ill. (color).
Rachel Mustalish inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, p. 165.
Phyllis Rose. Alfred Stieglitz: Taking Pictures, Making Painters. New Haven, 2019, p. 119, colorpl. 10.
John Marin (American, Rutherford, New Jersey 1870–1953 Cape Split, Maine)
1913
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