Though less tightly orchestrated than many of Prendergast’s seaside processionals, Promenade is typically organized into three horizontal bands of grass, sea and sky. The horizontal arrangement of the figures is abstractly echoed in coloristic sequences which are for the most part applied in broad, rectangular strokes, with the white ground visible around the blocks of color. While the immediate inspiration for this technique can be traced to the French painter George Seurat (whose works Prendergast studied on his trips to Europe and also at the Armory Show of 1913 in New York), Prendergast developed an individual style in which the dabs of color are so large they become components of a colorful mosaic pattern.
Object Date
1914/1915
Dimensions
Framed: 88 5/8 x 139 x 2 5/16 in. (225 x 353.06 x 5.87 cm)
85 x 134 in.
225.4 x 340.4 cm
Maurice Brazil Prendergast, Charles Prendergast: A Catalogue Raisonne, by Carol Clark, Nancy Mowll Mathews, and Gwendolyn Owens. Williamstown: Williams College.
