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Four women and dogs hunting in a mountainous landscape

Distant mountain peaks rise up at center on the opposite shore of a lake in this wilderness scene under blue skies with wispy clouds. In the foreground at lower right, three women clad in robes carry bows and wear quivers of arrows slung over their shoulders. The look and point away to the right as if ready to move that way, as two greyhounds attend. At lower center, a fourth woman, also with a bow, follows another dog down a grassy slope toward the near shore of the lake. Gnarled trees rise up at left and right.

Gallery Text

In the early 19th century, American artists joined their British counterparts and embarked on the Grand Tour. Washington Allston traveled to Europe upon his graduation from Harvard in 1800, and completed this large and ambitious work while in Rome in 1805. Loosely modeled on an alpine vista that Allston sketched while traveling from France to Italy, "Diana on a Chase" is evocative of the classical landscapes of Claude Lorrain and Nicolas Poussin. At right, the Roman goddess of the hunt and her companions wander through the vast mountainous scene.

Publicly exhibited in Rome, "Diana on a Chase" received glowing reviews and impressed Allston’s Romantically-minded contemporaries, including poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The artist’s pride in the work was short-lived, however: in 1839, Allston disavowed authorship of the painting, claiming that an aggressive cleaning had ruined his original conception.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
1956.62
People
Washington Allston, American (Georgetown, SC 1779 - 1843 Cambridge, MA)
Title
Diana on a Chase
Other Titles
Former Title: Landscape, Diana on a Chase
Former Title: Diana in the Chase
Former Title: Diana and Her Nymphs in the Chase
Former Title: Swiss Scenery
Former Title: Alpine Scenery
Classification
Paintings
Work Type
painting
Date
1805
Culture
American
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/299940

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
163.8 x 241.3 cm (64 1/2 x 95 in.)
framed: 206.4 x 285.8 x 12.7 cm (81 1/4 x 112 1/2 x 5 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • Signed: l.r.: W. Allston Pinx. Roma

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Loammi Baldwin, 1832; Isaac Davis, 1843; Mrs. Algernon Coolidge, Boston, MA, 1947; to her daughter, Mrs. Edward W. Moore, Cambridge, MA, 1956; her gift to the Fogg Art Museum, 1956.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Mrs. Edward W. Moore
Accession Year
1956
Object Number
1956.62
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Jules David Prown and Barbara Rose, American Painting: From the Colonial Period to the Present, Skira Rizzoli (New York), p.
  • Sixth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, exh. cat., Boston Athenaeum (Boston, MA, 1832)
  • Moses Foster Sweetser, Allston (Boston, MA, 1879), p. 72
  • "McMaster's History of the People of the United States", The Dial (April 1883), vol. III, no. 36, pp. 270-272, p. 271
  • Jared B. Flagg, The Life and Letters of Washington Allston, Charles Scribner's Sons (New York, NY, 1892), p. 145
  • James Thrall Soby and Dorothy C. Miller, Romantic Painting in America, exh. cat., The Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY, 1943), pp. 13, 52-53, cat. 3, ill. p. 52
  • Kathleen Coburn, "Notes on Washington Allston, from the Unpublished Notebooks of S. T. Coleridge", Gazette des Beaux-Arts (April 1944), vol. XXV, no. 926, pp. 249-252, ill. p. 251, fig. 2
  • Edgar P. Richardson, American Romantic Painting, ed. Robert Freund, E. Weyhe (New York, NY, 1944), p. 23, no. 14, ill.
  • Edgar P. Richardson, Washington Allston, 1779-1843, a loan exhibition of paintings, drawings and memorabilia, exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, MI, 1947), no. 7, ill. p. 16
  • Elizabeth H. Jones, "Washington Allston's Painting Technique and His Place in the Coloristic Tradition" (thesis (certificate in conservation), Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies, May 1947), Unpublished, pp. 1-17 passim
  • Edgar P. Richardson, Washington Allston: A Study of the Romantic Artist in America, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL, 1948), pp. 69-70, 74, 118, 177, 190, no. 37, pl. IX
  • Anna Wells Rutledge, Cumulative Record of Exhibition Catalogues: The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1807-1870; The Society of Artists, 1800-1814; The Artists’ Fund Society, 1835-1845. (Philadelphia, PA, 1955), p. 15, no. 20
  • Thomas W. Leavitt, "Washington Allston at Harvard", Harvard Alumni Bulletin (Cambridge, MA, April 21, 1956), vol. 58, no. 13, p. 551
  • Benjamin Rowland, "'Diana in the Chase' by Washington Allston", Fogg Art Museum Annual Report, 1955-56, Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1957), pp. 48, 61, ill p. 49
  • Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Notebooks of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Volume 2, 1804-1808, ed. Kathleen Coburn, Pantheon Books (New York, NY, 1957), pp. ix, 2830-2834, ill. fig. v
  • William H. Gerdts, "Washington Allston and the German Romantic Classicists in Rome", The Art Quarterly (Summer 1969), vol. XXXII, no. 2, pp. 167-196, pp. 170, 173,184, 188, fig. 4
  • Louise Todd Ambler and Kenyon Castle Bolton, III, "American Painting at Harvard", Antiques (New York, NY, November 1972), vol. 102, no. 5, pp. 876-883, p. 879, pl. III
  • Kenyon Castle Bolton, III, Peter G. Huenink, Earl A. Powell III, Harry Z. Rand, and Nanette C. Sexton, American Art at Harvard, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1972), cat. 30, ill.
  • Elizabeth Johns, "Washington Allston: The Artist as Philospher.", The Paintings of Washington Allston, Lowe Art Gallery (Miami, FL, 1975), pp. 14-15
  • Elizabeth Johns, "Washington Allston's Library", The American Art Journal (November 1975), vol. VII, no. 2, pp. 32-41, pp. 32, 34, fig. 2
  • The Paintings of Washington Allston, exh. cat., Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami (Coral Gables, FL, 1975), pp. 9, 15, 19
  • John Wilmerding, American Art, Penguin Books (New York, 1976), p. 65, pl. 70
  • Elizabeth Johns, "Washington Allston: Method, Imagination and Reality", Winterthur Portfolio (Wilmington, DE, 1977), vol. 12, pp. 1-18, pp. 1, 14
  • John Wilmerding, "Harvard and American Art", Apollo (June 1978), vol. CVII, no. 196, pp. 490-495, p. 491, pl. XXII
  • William H. Gerdts and Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr., "A Man of Genius": The Art of Washington Allston (1779-1843), exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (Boston, MA, 1979), pp. 39, 43, 46, 157, ill. p. 36, cat. 11
  • Elizabeth Johns, "Washington Allston and Samuel Taylor Coleridge: A Remarkable Relationship", Archives of American Art Journal (1979), vol. 19 no. 3, ill. p. 2
  • Joshua C. Taylor, The Fine Arts in America, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL, 1979), p. 57, ill.
  • Carol Troyen, The Boston Tradition: American Paintings from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, exh. cat., American Federation of Arts (New York, NY, 1980), p. 14
  • Bryan Jay Wolf, Romantic Re-Vision: Culture and Consciousness in Nineteenth-Century American Painting and Literature, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL and London, England, 1982), pp. 62-64, fig. 19
  • Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr., Carol Troyen, and Trevor J. Fairbrother, A New World: Masterpieces of American Painting, 1760-1910, exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (Boston, MA, 1983), p. 214, 215
  • Sona K. Johnston, American Paintings 1750-1900 from the Collection of The Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore Museum of Art (Baltimore, MD, 1983), p. 19
  • Kristin A. Mortimer and William G. Klingelhofer, Harvard University Art Museums: A Guide to the Collections, Harvard University Art Museums and Abbeville Press (Cambridge and New York, 1986), p. 184, cat. 209, ill.
  • Marcia Briggs Wallace, "Washington Allston's Moonlit Landscape", ed. Irma B. Jaffe, Fordham University Press (New York, 1989), pp. 89-92, fig. 45, fig. 46 det
  • Elinor S. Shaffer, "Illusion and Imagination: Derrida's Parergon and Coleridge's Aid to Reflection. Revisionary Readings of Kantian Formalist Aesthetics", Aesthetic Illusion: Theoretical and Historical Approaches, ed. Frederick Burwick and Walter Pape, Walter de Gruyter and Co. (Berlin and New York, 1990), pp. 138-157, pp. 152-155, fig. 17
  • Kathleen Nicholson, Turner's Classical Landscapes: Myth and Meaning, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ, 1990), pp. 24-26, fig. 19
  • Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr., William H. Gerdts, Erica E. Hirshler, Fred Licht, and William L. Vance, The Lure of Italy: American Artists and the Italian Experience, 1760-1914, exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston / Harry N. Abrams, Inc. (Boston, MA and New York, NY, 1992), pp. 172-174, cat. 10, ill.
  • Nathalia Wright, ed., The Correspondence of Washington Allston, The University Press of Kentucky (Lexington, KY, 1993), pp. 40, 43-44, 56, 59, 65, 69, 74-75, 83, 98-99, 131, 133-34, 538, 545, 559, 576, 614
  • Wayne Craven, American Art: History and Culture, Brown & Benchmark Publishers (Madison, WI, 1994), p. 148
  • Jane Turner, The Encyclopedia of American Art before 1914, Macmillan Publishers Limited (London, England, 2000), pp. 8-9, ill p. 9
  • Andrew Wilton and Tim Barringer, American Sublime: Landscape Painting in the United States, 1820-1880, exh. cat., Tate Gallery Publishing Limited (London and Princeton, NJ, 2002), p. 20, fig. 8
  • Gurion Taussig, Coleridge and the Idea of Friendship, 1789-1804, University of Delaware Press (Newark, DE, 2002), pp. 316-317
  • Erica E. Hirshler, "Pittori americani dell'Ottocento nella 'Grande Universita d'Arte' italiana", exh. cat., Linea d'Ombra (2008), p. 163, ill. opp. p. 159
  • Stephan Wolohojian and Alvin L. Clark, Jr., Harvard Art Museum/ Handbook, ed. Stephan Wolohojian, Harvard Art Museum (Cambridge, 2008), ill. p. 138
  • Morton D. Paley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the Fine Arts, Oxford University Press (UK) (Oxford, UK, 2008), pp. 39-42, 107, fig. 7
  • Stefano Susinno, L'Ottocento a Roma: Artisti, cantieri, atelier tra eta napoleonica e Restaurazione, Silvana Editoriale (Milan, 2009), pp. 205-207, fig. 86
  • Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr. and Melissa Renn, American Paintings at Harvard, Volume One: Paintings, Watercolors, and Pastels by Artists Born before 1826, Yale University Press (U.S.) and Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge and New Haven, 2014), pp. 33, 54-55, cat. 12, ill.
  • Anne Appleby, Laura Millin, and Tyler Green, Anne Appleby: Hymn, Missoula Art Museum (Missoula, 2021), pp. 67-68, repr. p. 68 as fig. 2

Exhibition History

  • [Washington Allston exhibition], Merchant Tailors' Hall, Bristol, 07/01/1814 - 07/31/1814
  • Seventh Annual Exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of The Fine Arts, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 05/01/1818 - 05/31/1818
  • Sixth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, Boston Athenaeum, Boston, 01/01/1832 - 12/31/1832
  • Romantic Painting in America, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 01/01/1943 - 12/31/1943
  • Washington Allston, 1779-1843: A Loan Exhibition of Paintings, Drawings and Memorabilia, Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, 05/11/1947 - 06/15/1947; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Boston, 07/17/1947 - 08/24/1947
  • American Art at Harvard, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/19/1972 - 06/18/1972
  • Master Paintings from the Fogg Collection, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/13/1977 - 08/31/1977
  • "A Man of Genius": The Art of Washington Allston (1779-1843), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Boston, 12/12/1979 - 02/03/1980; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 02/28/1980 - 04/27/1980
  • The Lure of Italy: American Artists and the Italian Experience, 1760-1914, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Boston, 09/16/1992 - 12/13/1992; Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, 02/03/1993 - 04/11/1993; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, 05/16/1993 - 08/08/1993
  • Re-View: S424-426 Western Art from 1560 to 1900, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 08/16/2008 - 06/18/2011
  • 32Q: 2240 18th Century, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 11/16/2014 - 08/06/2024

Subjects and Contexts

  • Collection Highlights
  • Google Art Project

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu