Paris 1989: American Artists at the Universal Exposition

Americans contributed 336 paintings to Paris's great world's fair, the Universal Exposition of 1889 that marked the centennial of the French Revolution. Ninety of these pictures have been tracked down and can be seen in a traveling exhibition. Although many of the U.S. contributions featured traditional works in such categories as city scenes, religious studies and landscapes, this delightful catalogue includes essays on each artist and reveals that the American paintings were not merely derivative of French art, as contemporaneous critics charged. Otto Bacher's view of rural Ohio life in the 1880s is almost photographic. Elihu Vedder's ornate fantasies give a symbolist reading of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Charles H. Davis's poetic, tonalist Valley is tinged with mystery and reverie. John Singer Sargent, Thomas Eakins, William Merritt Chase and George Inness also make an impressive showing. (Dec.)