Grand Chute Painting | Painting | Wisconsin Historical Society

Painting

Grand Chute Painting

Grand Chute Painting | Painting | Wisconsin Historical Society
" . . . At Grand Chute stood the young settlement of Appleton. Although only a few years old, it already boasted a college, named, as was the village itself, for an Eastern capitalist. The steep hill now crowned with Lawrence University buildings must have offered the artists a variety of illustrative possibilities, but they chose to paint clear views of the lower and upper locks, with closed gates. At the farther end of the dam, above the upper lock, stands in bold relief the flour mill of Theodore Conkey, a board member of the [Fox and Wisconsin] Improvement Company, now the site of Kimberly-Clark's Atlas Paper Mill. The upper Grand Chute was the last of the 'improvements' paintings signed by Brookes and Stevenson." (Alice E. Smith, "The Fox River Valley in Paintings," <i>Wisconsin Magazine of History</i>, 51(2), winter 1967-1968, p, 139, 145, 148-149.)
DESCRIPTION
" . . . At Grand Chute stood the young settlement of Appleton. Although only a few years old, it already boasted a college, named, as was the village itself, for an Eastern capitalist. The steep hill now crowned with Lawrence University buildings must have offered the artists a variety of illustrative possibilities, but they chose to paint clear views of the lower and upper locks, with closed gates. At the farther end of the dam, above the upper lock, stands in bold relief the flour mill of Theodore Conkey, a board member of the [Fox and Wisconsin] Improvement Company, now the site of Kimberly-Clark's Atlas Paper Mill. The upper Grand Chute was the last of the 'improvements' paintings signed by Brookes and Stevenson." (Alice E. Smith, "The Fox River Valley in Paintings," Wisconsin Magazine of History, 51(2), winter 1967-1968, p, 139, 145, 148-149.)
RECORD DETAILS
Image ID:91182
Creation Date: 1856
Creator Name:Brookes and Stevenson
City:
County:
State:Wisconsin
Collection Name:WHS Museum Collection
Genre:Painting
Original Format Type:paintings
Original Format Number:Museum 1942.526
Original Dimensions:18 x 12 inches
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
In 1856 Samuel Marsden Brookes and Thomas H. Stevenson "painted a group of river town sites and locks for the Fox-Wisconsin River Improvement Co. . . . and in 1909 the whole set of ten was purchased from Misses S.G. and D.B. Martin by the [Wisconsin] Historical Society for seventy-five dollars. Included in the group [is] . . . 'Grand Chute' . . . They are oil sketches about twelve by eighteen inches, mounted now on composition board, unframed, and, while helpful as geographical record, are without special merit as painting. Most of them show matter-of-fact views of the water of the river, with occasional buildings, — which however can be historically identified as particular residences, — and are rather sketchily done in contrast to Brookes' minute portrait style, evidencing probably the large part Stevenson played in their making. They were used, doubtlessly, in the promotion and advertising of the Improvement Company and their significance lies in the confirmation they give to the fact that the painter still functioned in the fifties in the utilitarian capacity of reporter and illustrator." (Porter Butts, Art in Wisconsin, 1936, p. 74.)
SUBJECTS
Locks (Hydraulic engineering)
Cities and towns
Hills
Landscape
Industrial buildings
Dams
Rivers
Trees
Dwellings

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Reference Details
Location:Wisconsin Historical Society Archives, 4th Floor, Madison, Wisconsin

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