European & American Paintings

Maryhill Museum of Art’s painting collection includes more than 250 works. These are generally of American and European origin and most were created during the 19th and 20th centuries. In 1948 and 1951, Alma de Bretteville Spreckels donated almost 20 paintings, nearly all of them the work of European artists.

The museum’s first director, Clifford Dolph (served 1938–1972), was an astute admirer of representational and realist painting and many of the museum’s most important paintings were acquired during his tenure. Dolph also exhibited, purchased and promoted the work of artists who may be considered American Classical Realists. In 2000, the R.H. Ives Gammell Studios Trust gave the museum a 23-panel series titled A Pictorial Sequence Painted by R. H. Ives Gammell Based on The Hound of Heaven–a painting cycle that had premiered at Maryhill in 1957. The museum’s collection of American Classical Realist works also includes examples by Gammell students Robert Douglas Hunter (1928–2014), Richard F. Lack (1928–2009), and Samuel Rose (1941–2008).

First: Frederic, 1st Baron Leighton of Stretton (British, 1830–1896), Solitude, 1890, oil on canvas, 72” x 36”; Museum purchase, Collection of Maryhill Museum of Art

Second: Edwin Howland Blashfield (American, 1848–1936), The Musician, c. 1887, oil on canvas, 36” x 26”; Gift of R.H. Ives Gammell, Collection of Maryhill Museum of Art

Third: R.H. Ives Gammell (American, 1893–1981), Hound of Heaven Panel XIII: “I was heavy with the even,” 1942–1956, oil on Masonite panel, 79” x 31”; Gift of the R.H. Ives Gammell Studios Trust, Collection of Maryhill Museum of Art

Fourth: Richard F. Lack (American, 1928–2009), The Concert, 1961, oil on canvas, 21½” x 19½”; Museum purchase, Collection of Maryhill Museum of Art